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| Iraq |
| Nine killed as Qaeda fighters plant flag in Baghdad |
| 2010-08-04 |
| [Dawn] Al-Qaeda fighters killed five policemen at a Baghdad checkpoint on Tuesday and planted the black flag of the terror network's front group in Iraq, an interior ministry official said. A traffic policeman and three soldiers were also killed in the capital, raising concerns that Iraq's security may be deteriorating after the government said more people died in violence in July than in any month since May 2008. The flag-planting incident was the second such act in less than a week. "Around 5:30 am (0230 GMT), men with silenced pistols shot dead five policemen at a checkpoint in Mansur neighbourhood before planting the flag of the Islamic State of Iraq (ISI)," the ministry official said. He said the traffic policeman was killed by a homemade bomb while a statement from Baghdad security forces said a soldier was killed by a second bomb and two other troops perished when they tried to disarm a third device. The shootings and bomb deaths follow a brazen series of attacks in the Iraqi capital on Thursday that killed 16 people, after which insurgents also hoisted the Al-Qaeda front group's black flag. Those incidents, which occurred in the north Baghdad neighbourhood of Adhamiyah within 15 minutes of each other, began with the killing of three soldiers. The fighters then burned their bodies and planted the flag. Three homemade bomb attacks on different routes to the scene of Thursday's shooting killed 13 more people, including three soldiers and three policemen, and wounded 14. In a statement on the Honein jihadist website on Tuesday, ISI claimed last week's attacks which it said "targeted the heart of the failed security plan of the Green Zone government," using its standard term for the Iraqi government to allege that it only controls the heavily-fortified centre of Baghdad. Tuesday's violence comes after Iraqi figures compiled by the ministries of health, interior and defence showed 535 people were killed by violence in July, the highest monthly figure in more than two years. The US military, however, has disputed those figures, saying they were "grossly overstated."US and Iraqi officials have warned of the dangers of an upsurge in violence if negotiations on forming a new government drag on, only one month before a major US troop pullout, giving insurgent groups an opportunity to further destabilise the country. Nearly five months since the March 7 general election which gave no single bloc an overall parliamentary majority, the two lists which won the most seats are still bickering over who should be the next prime minister. |
| Posted by:Fred |