More than 57 bodies fished out of Iraq river
Pakistan Times Foreign Desk Report

BAGHDAD (Iraq): More than 55 bodies were fished out of the Tigris River, south of Baghdad, on Wednesday as 19 Iraqi army soldiers were executed in a football stadium, in the latest carnage in violence-torn Iraq.

“They were killed and they threw the bodies in the Tigris ... We have the full names of those who were killed and of those criminals who committed these crimes,” President Jalal Talabani told reporters in Baghdad.

Talabani said a new Iraqi government would finally be unveiled on Thursday, 80 days after landmark elections, but the relentless violence overshadowed the announcement as a string of attacks since late Tuesday cost more than 30 lives.
Police announced the gruesome discovery of 57 bodies of men and children in Suwayrah, some 40 kilometres south of the capital.

They were found in an area downriver from Madain where unconfirmed reports last weekend said Shia hostages were taken by Sunni rebels. Iraqi officials later denied there had been any hostage-taking.

“The terrorists committed crimes there, and it is not true that there were no hostages, there were,” said the president, following denials from officials in the outgoing government including the interior minister.

Perspective

Police in Suwayrah said the bodies were recovered from the banks of the river between the towns of Al-Wihda and Hafriyah which are in an insurgent-strong belt south of the capital. The bodies were buried near Suwayrah after their pictures were taken, said police.

And in another grim incident, insurgents executed 19 soldiers in Haditha, 260 kilometres northwest of the Iraqi capital, an interior ministry official said.

“These soldiers belonged to a group of 20 men who were travelling by bus to their base in Haditha when they were intercepted” by insurgents, the official said.

“They were taken to the stadium where they were executed,” he said. “Only one soldier survived and he has been taken to the town’s hospital.”

Bomb Blasts

In Baghdad, three car bombs exploded in as many hours, following two similar deadly strikes on Tuesday, as insurgents stepped up attacks in the capital after a relative lull following the January 30 election.

Two people were killed, including a child, and at least five wounded, hospital sources said, in the first car bomb attack in the western district of Amiriyah, that appeared to target a US patrol.

The US military said it had no word of casualties among its ranks.

A second car bomb wounded eight near the Bilat al-Shuhada police station in the southern district of Dura. At least three more civilians were hurt when another car bomb exploded in Dura, also as a police patrol drove by.

In a third incident in Dura, three people, including a woman and a Shia religious dignitary, were killed in a drive by shooting, said an interior ministry official.

The Al-Qaeda-linked group of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, in a statement on the Internet, said it carried out the three suicide attacks.

The latest attacks in Baghdad followed two deadly suicide car bombs on Tuesday. Six people were killed outside an Iraqi army recruitment centre in Baghdad, and the other bomb killed two US soldiers south of the capital.

Political Front

On the political front, Talabani said on state-run Iraqiya TV that prime minister-designate Ibrahim al-Jaafari would unveil his government on Thursday.

He made the announcement after meeting with Jaafari, outgoing Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, and Shia leader Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, a key member of the United Iraq Alliance (UIA), the Shia list which won the January 30 elections. Separately, UIA member Ali Dabbagh said leaders were still sorting out the final cabinet names.

Jaafari’s cabinet would have to be first approved by the presidential council which includes Talabani and his two deputies Ghazi al-Yawar, a Sunni, and a Shia, Adel Abdul Mahdi before it is put to a vote in parliament. The national assembly is scheduled to meet Sunday.

A final sticking point appeared to involve the number of ministries to be given to members of Allawi’s list, which came in third in the elections and is eagerly courted by the Kurds to temper the influence of clerics in the UIA.

“The negotiations are continuing above all with the Iraqi list of Mr Allawi, as well as with the Sunni Arabs,” said Mariam al-Rais, a UIA deputy involved in the talks.●