"The deaths squads that we have captured are in the defense and interior ministries,''
We picked the goverment by deciding who was 'clean enough' to be an elected official in Iraq. We trained the soldiers, and militia, and the police. They run death squads. WE are instigating turmoil in Iraq. We will not stop... until every... last... drop... of oil has been stripped from Iraqi control.
In 2003, the US military operations in Iraq consumed 400,000 bbls of crude oil EVERY DAY. (cite on request)
San Jose Mercury-News:
AMERICA IN IRAQ Iraq officials confirm death squad operations BLASTS KILL DOZENS IN SLUM; POLITICAL FALLOUT FEARED By Matthew Schofield Knight Ridder
http://www.mercurynews.com/mld/mercurynews/news/14086733.htm?template=contentModules/printstory.jsp
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Senior Iraqi officials Sunday confirmed for the first time that death squads composed of government employees had operated illegally from inside two government ministries.
``The deaths squads that we have captured are in the defense and interior ministries,'' Minister of Interior Bayan Jabr said during a joint news conference with the Minister of Defense. ``There are people who have infiltrated the army and the interior.''
Jabr said Sunday that investigations into death squads still were ongoing in the Defense Ministry. He said the Interior Ministry had arrested 22 people, but released 18 suspects after questioning them.
Also on Sunday, a series of powerful explosions ripped through a Shiite Muslim slum in eastern Baghdad, killing at least 50 people and wounding more than 200.
The Sadr City bombers struck shortly after U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad and leaders of Iraq's main ethnic and religious blocs concluded a news conference to announce agreement to move forward the first session of the new parliament to Thursday.
The attackers struck with car bombs, including a suicide driver, and mortars at the peak shopping time, destroying dozens of market stalls and vehicles as the explosives ripped through the poor neighborhood as residents were buying food for their evening meals.
Official casualty tolls were not available. Capt. Salman al-Nuaimi of the Interior Ministry said 52 people were killed and 208 wounded in the attacks. He said police found a fourth car that was wired with explosives and defused it.
Many of the wounded suffered life-threatening injuries, officials said.
Hazim al-Araji, a spokesman for the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose followers maintain a large presence in Sadr City, said on Al-Jazeera satellite TV network that 50 people had been killed and more than 295 injured. He said the blasts appeared to have been coordinated.
The targeting of Sadr City could provoke a strong political backlash. Sadr City is a bastion of support for Sadr, a key backer of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari's bid for re-election. Jaafari's nomination is strongly opposed by Sunni and Kurdish leaders, although he is supported by the United Iraqi Alliance, the Shiite political bloc that is the largest in parliament.
Sadr's Mahdi Army, a well-armed militia that the U.S. military estimates has about 10,000 members, also was extremely active in attacks on Sunni mosques in the aftermath of last month's bombing of a key Shiite shrine in Samarra that touched off a wave of sectarian killings.
Elsewhere around Baghdad, a series of roadside bombs and gun attacks killed 17 people.
Death squad scale
Although Jabr appeared to confirm the existence of death squads, the scale of the operation uncovered would appear to be far smaller than critics had alleged.
Sunni Muslims have long complained about Shiite death squads that arrived wearing official uniforms and rode in official-looking vehicles to haul away victims.
Knight Ridder reported the accusation of death squads in February 2005, and in June documented many cases in which victims taken away allegedly by men wearing Interior Ministry commando uniforms were later found handcuffed and executed with a bullet to the back of the head.
The government had long denied the existence of such death squads. Sunnis had accused the Badr Organization, a Shiite militia supported by Iran, of being behind the killings, inside or outside of government ministries. Jabr is a senior leader of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq, a leading Shiite political party, and has close ties to the Badr Organization.
Execution foiled
The investigation that led to Sunday's confirmation of government death squads came after U.S. forces stopped a group of men who were passing through a checkpoint in late January. The men wore official uniforms and said they were preparing to execute a Sunni man in their custody.
The atmosphere of chaos in Iraq has been stoked in part by the failure of politicians to form a new government nearly three months after national elections.
Sunday, political leaders said they would open marathon meetings today in an attempt to reach agreement on a new government. Khalilzad said he would be available to join the talks at any time.
Among the issues to be discussed are how many positions various blocs will get in the new government, which will fill key posts and the government's program of action.
The first parliamentary session will take place three months after Dec. 15 elections and a month after the results were certified. It sets in motion a 60-day deadline for the legislature to elect a new president, approve the nomination of a prime minister and sign off on his Cabinet.
Khalilzad said a permanent government needed to be in place quickly to fill the ``vacuum in authority'' at a time of continuing effort by ``terrorists to provoke sectarian conflict.''
``To deal with the threat,'' there is ``the need on an urgent basis to form a government of national unity,'' Khalilzad said.
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