P
Patriot Games
Guest
http://www.foxnews.com/wires/2007Dec03/0,4670,Iraq,00.html
12 Bodies Unearthed in Iraq Mass Grave
Monday, December 03, 2007
BAGHDAD - A mass grave containing the remains of 12 people, including a
paramedic who disappeared more than a year ago, was unearthed in central
Iraq in an area long controlled by al-Qaida, officials said Monday.
Two of the decomposed bodies were beheaded, according to an official at the
general hospital in Fallujah, where the bodies were taken after their
discovery north of the Anbar province city on Sunday.
Hospital officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were
not permitted to release details of the discovery, said some appeared to
have been killed as recently as four months ago, and some of the deaths
dated to 18 months ago.
Along with the bodies was a Health Ministry card that belonged to the
missing Iraqi paramedic, according to footage from AP Television News.
Iraqi troops unearthed the bodies Sunday afternoon near Lake Tharthar, a
man-made body of water about 60 miles northeast of Baghdad that has been the
site of several mass graves found in recent months. Since ousting extremists
in some of the country's most violent areas, Iraqis from both Islamic sects
have stepped up their patrols for the missing, leading to more discoveries.
In late November, a grave containing 40 bodies was found north of Ramadi
near the lake in an area recently controlled by al-Qaida in Iraq.
In early November, 29 bodies were found near the lake, and the day after
that discovery another mass grave containing 17 corpses was unearthed in a
brushy area west of Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Officials said
at the time the bodies were likely those of people who had been seized at
fake checkpoints and murdered because of their sectarian affiliation.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte on Sunday pressed leaders of
Iraq's religious and ethnic factions to take advantage of recent security
gains to push through legislation aimed at cementing national reconciliation
or risk a return to greater violence.
"The security surge has delivered significant results, now progress on
political reconciliation including key national legislation as well as
economic advances is needed to consolidate the gains made thus far,"
Negroponte said at a news conference in Baghdad. "If progress is not made on
these fronts we risk falling back to the more violent patterns of the past."
Political progress has been elusive, with lawmakers clashing over Kurdish
oil deals with foreign companies and engaging in heated exchanges over a
draft bill that would allow thousands of former members of Saddam Hussein's
Baath party to return to their government jobs. Both measures are among the
18 benchmarks set by President Bush's administration to encourage
reconciliation.
Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani, using unusually strong language, told
Iraqi state television late Sunday that the contracts signed by the largely
self-ruled Kurdish region were illegal and that the companies involved had
been told so by the Iraqi government.
"No region has the right to go it alone and sign a deal," he said. "This
will lead to the breakup of Iraq ... oil is the business of the federal
government and any attempt at extracting oil without the approval of the
federal government is tantamount to smuggling."
Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan,
said al-Shahristani's comments were unwarranted.
"No one has the right to slander the legitimacy of contracts signed by the
government of Kurdistan and the foreign companies," Abdullah said.
In a hopeful sign for political progress, lawmakers from Iraq's largest
Sunni Arab bloc on Monday ended their boycott of parliament over the "house
arrest" of their leader, Adnan al-Dulaimi, who also attended the session.
Al-Dulaimi was under guard at his home for more than two days after one of
his security guards was allegedly discovered last week with the keys to a
car laden with explosives near his office in a western Baghdad neighborhood.
Al-Dulaimi's son and 30 other people were arrested Friday.
The government has consistently denied that al-Dulaimi, one of Iraq's most
powerful Sunni Arab politicians, was placed under house arrest, insisting he
was prevented from leaving home for his own safety.
Defusing the crisis, the government moved him Sunday to a hotel a short
distance away from parliament's building in the heavily guarded Green Zone,
also home to the offices of Iraq's government and the U.S. Embassy.
The U.S. military has said violence in Iraq has fallen to lows not seen
since January 2006, just before the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in
Samarra set off reprisal killings that have left tens of thousands of Iraqis
dead and pushed the country to the brink of civil war. But top American
commanders have warned that Sunni and Shiite extremists still pose a serious
threat.
The mutilated bodies of four guards at an oil facility who were kidnapped at
a checkpoint on their way back from vacation were found north of Baghdad on
Monday, said Col. Khali al-Zubaie, a spokesman for the Iraqi army in Kirkuk.
A fifth man who disappeared with them remained missing, he said.
Thousands of Iraqis have disappeared as a result of a Sunni-led insurgency
and sectarian violence since Saddam Hussein's 2003 ouster.
12 Bodies Unearthed in Iraq Mass Grave
Monday, December 03, 2007
BAGHDAD - A mass grave containing the remains of 12 people, including a
paramedic who disappeared more than a year ago, was unearthed in central
Iraq in an area long controlled by al-Qaida, officials said Monday.
Two of the decomposed bodies were beheaded, according to an official at the
general hospital in Fallujah, where the bodies were taken after their
discovery north of the Anbar province city on Sunday.
Hospital officials, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were
not permitted to release details of the discovery, said some appeared to
have been killed as recently as four months ago, and some of the deaths
dated to 18 months ago.
Along with the bodies was a Health Ministry card that belonged to the
missing Iraqi paramedic, according to footage from AP Television News.
Iraqi troops unearthed the bodies Sunday afternoon near Lake Tharthar, a
man-made body of water about 60 miles northeast of Baghdad that has been the
site of several mass graves found in recent months. Since ousting extremists
in some of the country's most violent areas, Iraqis from both Islamic sects
have stepped up their patrols for the missing, leading to more discoveries.
In late November, a grave containing 40 bodies was found north of Ramadi
near the lake in an area recently controlled by al-Qaida in Iraq.
In early November, 29 bodies were found near the lake, and the day after
that discovery another mass grave containing 17 corpses was unearthed in a
brushy area west of Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Officials said
at the time the bodies were likely those of people who had been seized at
fake checkpoints and murdered because of their sectarian affiliation.
U.S. Deputy Secretary of State John Negroponte on Sunday pressed leaders of
Iraq's religious and ethnic factions to take advantage of recent security
gains to push through legislation aimed at cementing national reconciliation
or risk a return to greater violence.
"The security surge has delivered significant results, now progress on
political reconciliation including key national legislation as well as
economic advances is needed to consolidate the gains made thus far,"
Negroponte said at a news conference in Baghdad. "If progress is not made on
these fronts we risk falling back to the more violent patterns of the past."
Political progress has been elusive, with lawmakers clashing over Kurdish
oil deals with foreign companies and engaging in heated exchanges over a
draft bill that would allow thousands of former members of Saddam Hussein's
Baath party to return to their government jobs. Both measures are among the
18 benchmarks set by President Bush's administration to encourage
reconciliation.
Oil Minister Hussain al-Shahristani, using unusually strong language, told
Iraqi state television late Sunday that the contracts signed by the largely
self-ruled Kurdish region were illegal and that the companies involved had
been told so by the Iraqi government.
"No region has the right to go it alone and sign a deal," he said. "This
will lead to the breakup of Iraq ... oil is the business of the federal
government and any attempt at extracting oil without the approval of the
federal government is tantamount to smuggling."
Jamal Abdullah, a spokesman for the regional government of Iraqi Kurdistan,
said al-Shahristani's comments were unwarranted.
"No one has the right to slander the legitimacy of contracts signed by the
government of Kurdistan and the foreign companies," Abdullah said.
In a hopeful sign for political progress, lawmakers from Iraq's largest
Sunni Arab bloc on Monday ended their boycott of parliament over the "house
arrest" of their leader, Adnan al-Dulaimi, who also attended the session.
Al-Dulaimi was under guard at his home for more than two days after one of
his security guards was allegedly discovered last week with the keys to a
car laden with explosives near his office in a western Baghdad neighborhood.
Al-Dulaimi's son and 30 other people were arrested Friday.
The government has consistently denied that al-Dulaimi, one of Iraq's most
powerful Sunni Arab politicians, was placed under house arrest, insisting he
was prevented from leaving home for his own safety.
Defusing the crisis, the government moved him Sunday to a hotel a short
distance away from parliament's building in the heavily guarded Green Zone,
also home to the offices of Iraq's government and the U.S. Embassy.
The U.S. military has said violence in Iraq has fallen to lows not seen
since January 2006, just before the bombing of a revered Shiite shrine in
Samarra set off reprisal killings that have left tens of thousands of Iraqis
dead and pushed the country to the brink of civil war. But top American
commanders have warned that Sunni and Shiite extremists still pose a serious
threat.
The mutilated bodies of four guards at an oil facility who were kidnapped at
a checkpoint on their way back from vacation were found north of Baghdad on
Monday, said Col. Khali al-Zubaie, a spokesman for the Iraqi army in Kirkuk.
A fifth man who disappeared with them remained missing, he said.
Thousands of Iraqis have disappeared as a result of a Sunni-led insurgency
and sectarian violence since Saddam Hussein's 2003 ouster.
