Iraqi insurgents killed nine more Shi’ite pilgrims on Wednesday as the toll from the previous day’s suicide attack rose to 117 amid fears that a backlash could undermine the United States-led Baghdad security plan.
At least two suicide bombers detonated explosive vests on Tuesday in a crowd of Shi’ites marching through the central town of Hilla on foot towards the holy city of Karbala for Friday’s Arbaeen religious festival.
Doctor Saad al-Shemari of Hilla hospital said that, along with the 117 dead, there were another 173 wounded — many of them critically — and that the number of fatalities was expected to rise still further.
”After every kind of attack, we’re concerned about restarting the cycle of sectarian violence,” said US spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Chris Garver.
”So we hope that people remain calm and don’t play into the terrorists’ hands by restarting the cycle, and let the Iraqi security forces do their job. We’re concerned about every attack,” he said.
The killings continued on Wednesday as — undaunted — thousands of pilgrims continued their march of devotion, carrying banners and copies of the Qur’an and marching hundreds of kilometres to Karbala’s revered shrines.
An official at Yarmukh hospital in Baghdad said the bodies of eight pilgrims had been brought in overnight — seven of them blown up by an roadside bomb and one shot — and that 23 wounded people had been treated.
A ninth devotee was killed and three wounded when a group walking on the main highway towards Karbala from Baghdad was raked with gunfire by unknown attackers early on Wednesday, according to another medical source.
At least 28 Shi’ite pilgrims had already been killed around the country on Tuesday before the Hilla blasts, in sectarian attacks by Sunni insurgents seeking to spread chaos and undermine Iraq’s Shi’ite-led government.
Karbala’s governor, Aqil Al-Kazaali, told reporters that 8 000 extra Iraqi police and soldiers had been deployed around the city to protect the pilgrims once they arrived.
US-led forces captured 24 suspected Al-Qaeda militants in raids around Iraq on Wednesday, Garver said.
Last month, Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki and his American allies launched Operation Fardh al-Qanoon (Imposing Law) as a last-ditch bid to regain control of the capital and quell violence between Sunni and Shi’ite factions.
The plan, which has seen about 90 000 extra US and Iraqi troops on the streets, has scored some initial successes.
A joint US and Iraqi force had been able to set up fortified outposts in many areas of Baghdad, including Sadr City, the once notorious bastion of radical Shi’ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr’s feared Mahdi Army militia.
But while Shi’ite fighters seem to be content to disappear into the shadows while Maliki’s largely Shi’ite security forces carry out their work, Sunni bombers with al-Qaeda links have stepped up their attacks.
Outrages like Tuesday’s massacre in Hilla — which mainly killed the kind of young religious Shi’ite male drawn to groups like the Mahdi Army — undermine confidence in the security forces and could trigger a backlash.
There was a further blow to the credibility of the security forces on Tuesday when a large force of al-Qaeda militants stormed a prison outside the northern city of Mosul and freed 140 inmates — including foreign Arab fighters.
Hasham al-Hamadani, the head of Nineveh province’s security committee, said fighters loyal to al-Qaeda kingpin Omar al-Baghdadi had infiltrated the area around Mosul and masterminded the jailbreak.
”They attacked the prison today [Tuesday] with a large number of insurgents armed with light and medium weapons, like machine guns. They didn’t face much resistance from the guards, because they overwhelmed them,” he said.
”They were driving Opel sedans and pick-ups,” he said. ”The entered the jail and freed between 140 and 150 prisoners, including Arabs and foreign fighters. A US helicopter arrived and opened fire, killing five escapees.
”The prison is now under control again, since American forces arrived.”
At the start of the year Badush jail was holding 1 200 of the most dangerous prisoners in Iraq, including 100 foreign fighters. — AFP
