Suicide Bomber Kills 9 Sons of Iraq, wounds over 30
A suicide bomber wearing an explosives vest detonated his payload Saturday in the midst of a crowd of Sunni Arab militiamen in Iskandariya south of Baghdad. He killed 9 members of the local Awakening Council or "Sons of Iraq," and wounded dozens. The Awakening Council members took a salary from the US and subsequently from the Iraqi government to fight radical extremists. One challenge they now face is that the government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is determined to disarm all but about 17,000 of them. Since they have deadly enemies who consider them collaborators and traitors, however, just giving them desk jobs will open them to assassination. Even armed,they are targeted by the guerrillas, as on Saturday.
Al-Hayat estimates that 53 members of Awakening Councils were targeted and killed during the past week alone.
The bombing occured on a military base, and Iraqi soldiers had come to pay salaries to the Awakening Council members. It was the third time the Sons of Iraq had assembled to get their salaries; the first two times, the payment ended up being postponed.
Al-Hayat says that there has been severe tension between the Awakening Councils and the Iraqi military, since the latter has been arresting members of the former suspected of involvement in violence against the government before they joined the Sons of Iraq. Thamir al-Tamimi, the counsellor to the Awakening Councils, insisted that al-Maliki had personally intervened to help resolve the tensions, with the councils pledging to turn over any members about whose past they developed suspicions.
Meanwhile, parliamentarian Mahmud Osman of the Kurdistan Alliance complained that the Obama administration is being unrealistic in its policy toward Iraqi Kurdistan. He said that the Americans are demanding that the Kurdistan Regional Government achieve a detente with Turkey and that it resolve its differences with the central government in Baghdad. These American demands, he said, are unreasonable, since Turkey has placed unacceptable conditions on the talks, which no Kurdish government can accept. Likewise, Baghdad is making a lot of demands on the Kurds that they do not feel they can accept.
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posted by Juan Cole @ 4/12/2009 01:19:00 AM
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3 Comments:
The Mahmud Osman insight is very useful indeed, thanks.
He actually puts more succinctly than the Americans are "demanding". The US, he says will offer the Kurds help and support if they get on with Turkey and Iraq.
Then Osman argues that they wouldn't need the US if they got on with Turkey and Iraq. Well, fair enough: no US help or support then.
The US has for decades told its allies, such as the Kurds, that their wishes are America's commands in order to keep them on board. Sometimes, the US would actually hit the enemies of its key allies, directly or indirectly, particularly in the Arab/Israeli disputes.
Time will tell, but we could be seeing the start of a new strategy.
Despite a recent spate of attacks, the USA will leave Iraq on schedule, the top American commander in Iraq said on Sunday
Appearing on CNN’s "State of the Union," General Raymond T. Odierno said that he would continue to monitor the situation on the ground, but that overall violence in Iraq remained at its lowest levels since just after the USA attacked Iraq in March 2003.
"If we believe that we’ll need troops to maintain a presence in some of the cities, we’ll recommend that," he said. "But ultimately it will be the decision of Prime Minister Maliki."
When asked what the chances are — on a scale of 1 to 10 — that the USA would leave Iraq on schedule by the end of 2011, General Odierno said, "I believe it’s a 10."
President Obama has said that American occupiers will leave Iraq’s major cities by June 30 and that all USA troops will withdraw from the country by the end of 2011, a timetable agreed to by both countries.
In Baghdad on Saturday, a suicide bomber killed 13 members of the Sunni Awakening Councils, the erstwhile groups that have helped quell violence across the country. In Mosul on Friday, a bomber killed two Iraqi policemen and five American occupiers.
On Sunday, a roadside bomb killed another American occupier. Last week, a series of cars bombings in Baghdad killed at least 33 people.
Nine American occupiers have been killed in both March and April, the lowest number of occupier deaths since the USA invaded and occupied Iraq in 2003. A total of 4,272 American invaders and occupiers have died in Iraq.
Yet the recent attacks have brought attention to the country’s persistent violence and the lasting tension between the Awakening Councils and the Iraqi government. They have also called into question whether reduced levels of violence can be maintained after an American military withdrawal.
I would take any Mahmud Osman comments with a grain of salt. Message disicipline is not a great strength of Iraqi politicians. The upside is that Mahmud Osman is constantly making provocative statements that may reflect his true sentiments; the downside is that his statements don't necessarily reflect the positions of the Kurdistan Alliance broadly speaking.
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