Print

Mail

wiki links

US loses Iraqi ally in bombing

A key leader of a US-backed Sunni armed group was blown apart in an al-Qaeda in Iraq double suicide bombing, days after Osama bin Laden condemned the new US allies and said they would "suffer in life and in the afterlife."

At least 11 others died in the attack.

The Baghdad bombing, which also wounded 28 on Monday, was the latest in a series of recent attacks targeting members of groups that turned against al-Qaeda in Iraq last year and have been credited with helping dramatically reduce violence across the country over the past six months.

"The barbaric nature of AQI [al-Qaeda in Iraq] continues to find new depths of depravity in killing courageous Iraqi citizens who reject the terrorists and their Taliban ideology," the US military said in a statement, using an acronym for al-Qaeda in Iraq.

The effect the groups, known as "awakening councils," have had on security appears to have provoked bin Laden.

In an audiotape released on Dec. 29, the terror leader warned Iraq's Sunni Arabs against joining the groups, who he said "have betrayed the nation and brought disgrace and shame to their people. They will suffer in life and in the afterlife."

"I advise those who follow the path of temptation should wash out this disgrace by repentance," he said. "This participation [in the Awakening Councils] is a great apostasy and sedition that will lead them to Hell."

US military spokesman Major General Kevin Bergner said last week the recent attacks were the "clearest indication" that AQI -- believed to consist mainly of Iraqis but to have foreign leadership -- was worried about losing the support of its fellow Sunni Arabs.

Monday's bombing occurred at the entrance of a Sunni Endowment office, a government agency that cares for Sunni mosques and shrines and near an Awakening Council office in Baghdad's northern Azamiyah district, which had been a stronghold of Sunni insurgents and a safe haven for AQI.

The first suicide bomber walked up to Riyadh al-Samarrai, a former police colonel and head of the local Awakening Council group, and embraced him before blowing himself up, said one of al-Samarrai's guards who was wounded in the attack.

"A man came saying that he is a friend of Colonel Riyadh al-Samarrai," the guard said from his bed in al-Nuaman hospital. "He met him and embraced him and after a few seconds, the explosion took place." He spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals.

As people rushed to evacuate the wounded, a suicide car bomber detonated his explosives just meters away, said Baghdad's chief military spokesman, Brigadier Qassim al-Moussawi.

Sunni Endowment leader Ahmed Abdul Ghafur al-Samarrai -- who is from the same tribe as the colonel -- blamed bin Laden for the attack.

"Those criminal gangs fled from al-Anbar Province to Azamiyah neighborhood for bloodshed and to abuse the dignity of the people," he said, referring to the province west of Baghdad that was an AQI stronghold.

The "awakening council" movement began there late in 2006.

"This criminal act occurred according to the urging of Bin Laden against the awakening. He incited al-Qaeda" to kill awakening fighters.

The founder of the awakening movement, Abdul-Sattar Abu Risha, was killed by a bomb in September, 10 days after meeting US President George W. Bush at a US base in Anbar.

Despite "their plot of murdering Abdul Sattar Abu Risha, Anbar became more secure," the Endowment leader said. "Thus Azamiyah now is more stable, people have agreed to chase the criminals, and al-Qaeda won't stay in Iraq."

He said Monday's attack had "increased Iraqis' strength ... against those who want to create sectarian divisions."
This story has been viewed 1136 times.