Iraq churches bombed
>>From correspondents in Mosul, Iraq
Reuters
December 8, 2004
GUNMEN bombed two churches in the tense Iraqi city of Mosul today,
fuelling fears of ethnic and sectarian unrest ahead of an election
next month.
The insurgent war of attrition against US forces and their Iraqi
proteges claimed another American life in Baghdad, taking the US
combat death toll to 1000 since last year’s invasion.At least four
Iraqi National Guard troopers were also killed in two incidents,
one in the capital and another further south.
A new CIA assessment, reported by the New York Times, gave a gloomy
picture of Iraq’s future, seeing further insecurity if the government
fails to assert itself and promote prosperity.
Iraq’s US-backed prime minister, Iyad Allawi, reaffirmed the election
date of January 30 but raised the prospect of troubled regions
taking two or three weeks longer to vote – a proposal that could not
immediately be checked with election officials and would break a UN
deadline of January 31 for the ballot.
Mr Allawi visited Moscow, where President Vladimir Putin, an opponent
of the US invasion, gave him a candidly gloomy view.
“I cannot imagine how elections can be organised under a full
occupation of the country by foreign troops,” he said. “I also cannot
imagine how you on your own will be able to restore the situation in
the country and stop it from breaking up.”
No one was killed nor, it appeared, injured, in the bombings in
Mosul; smoke billowed from one of the northern city’s Armenian
churches and one of its oldest Chaldean churches was ablaze and a
wall shattered. The attackers were not identified.
In the city of 1.2 million the two main Sunni Muslim communities,
Arabs and Kurds, are already on edge following a rout of US-trained
police last month by Sunni Arab insurgents.
The latest in a series of attacks on Christians was grist to the mill
of those who believe Iraq risks slipping into civil war.
At least 16 Kurdish peshmerga fighters were killed in a suicide car
bomb attack in Mosul on Saturday. US troops have turned to the Kurds,
largely autonomous in the nearby mountains and with well-trained
fighting forces, to help police Mosul.
Sunni Arabs make up about 20 per cent of Iraq’s population but have
dominated the country for centuries, including under fellow Sunni
Saddam Hussein. With the election set to transfer power to the 60
per cent Shiite Muslim majority, many Sunnis are unhappy and some
have called for a boycott of the vote.
They argue that violence by insurgents led, apparently by former
Saddam loyalists and some foreign-inspired Islamists, will make it
impossible to vote safely in much of Sunni northern and western Iraq,
including much of Baghdad.
The small Christian community of about 650,000 – about three per cent
of the population – has suffered from an upsurge in militant Islam
since the fall of Saddam’s secular regime. Some have fled or closed
down traditional businesses, notably selling liquor, which flourished
in Iraq despite a Muslim religious ban.
At least one Christian leader has been quoted recently saying he
would form an armed militia to protect the community.
“There were two or three families in the church,” one frightened
worshipper from Mosul’s ancient Tahira Chaldean church said after
the attack on the white stone building, some of which is said to date
back to the 7th century.
“Gunmen came in, took the guard’s weapon and a couple of mobile
phones. Then they made everybody leave the church. After that there
was an explosion that did a lot of damage,” said the man, who asked
not to be named for fear of intimidation.
Christians, possibly targeted partly because radical Muslims link
them with the “crusader” invaders from America and Europe, have been
attacked several times in the past four months.
Coordinated car bombings, four in Baghdad and one in Mosul, killed
at least 12 people in August; five Baghdad churches were bombed on
October 16 at the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan.
At least eight people were killed in two church bombings in the capital
on November 8, and a car bomber attacked police guarding the hospital
where the wounded had been taken.
An election that provides a legitimate Iraqi government that can
defend itself is a prerequisite for US President George W. Bush to
declare the invasion a success and bring troops home.
International voting experts will meet in Canada this month to try
to find a way of monitoring the election in the likely absence of
outside observers, a top Canadian official said.
To protect the vote, Mr Bush is boosting US troop numbers by about
10 per cent to 150,000.
Mr Bush sought to boost US troop morale by promising to train Iraqi
forces to replace them, though he acknowledged mixed results so far.
“Some Iraqi units have performed better than others,” he told thousands
of camouflage-clad Marines at Camp Pendleton, California.
“Some Iraqis have been intimidated enough by the insurgents to leave
the service to their country.”
But he said “a great many are standing firm”.
The unidentified soldier killed today was on patrol in Baghdad when
guerrillas opened fire with rifles.
Earlier, the Pentagon had issued a revised combat casualty toll of
999 and the death thus took the toll since the invasion on March 20
last year to 1000.
A further 275 US troops have died in accidents or other incidents
not classified as being killed in action.
The American death toll had risen sharply last month during the US
assault on Sunni insurgents in the city of Fallujah. At least 71
Americans were killed there. A total of 9765 US troops have been
wounded.