03-02-2007, 10:45 AM
Follow up to post 163:
http://nz.news.yahoo.com/070302/5/3ut.html
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Friday March 2, 11:16 PM
<b>14 Iraqi police missing</b>
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Fourteen Iraqi police officers have gone missing and an al Qaeda-linked group on Friday showed pictures of 18 men it said had been kidnapped to avenge the alleged rape of a woman last month.
The al Qaeda-linked group said in an Internet statement it had kidnapped 18 men working for the Interior Ministry in Diyala province, north of Baghdad.
A police source in Diyala said 14 men, including a high ranking officer, left their base in western Baquba around 11 a.m. (0800 GMT) on Thursday to return to their homes in an area called Saadiyet al Shat, north of Baquba.
"Since then nobody has seen them. Their families are calling them, but nobody can reach them," the source said on Friday, adding they were in civilian cars to avoid attention.
Interior Ministry officials in Baghdad said they had no information on the reports of the kidnapping in Diyala.
Diyala is home to Shi'ites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds and has seen relentless bloodshed, including mass kidnappings and ambushes of police at their bases and in convoys. Sunni Arabs in the province say <b>the police are infiltrated by militias</b>.
The Internet statement included photographs showing 18 men, some in uniform and some in civilian clothing, blindfolded in a room. Some of the men had what appeared to be identity papers pinned to their shirts but it was not possible to read them.
"God enabled a group of lions of the <span style='color:blue'>Islamic State in Iraq to detain 18 affiliates of the Interior Ministry in Diyala province," said the statement posted on a Web site often used by radical Islamist groups such as Sunni Arab al Qaeda.</span>
<b>RETALIATION</b>
"This blessed operation came in response to what these apostates are doing in fighting the Sunni folk and the last such act by these treacherous agencies was the rape of our sister ... Sabreen Janabi."
(Wait. Aren't the islamics deviating from the holy laws laid down by allah's mouthpiece mohammed? Isn't it true that in Islam, that great religion famed for its respect of women, the witness of a woman is worth half - or is it quarter - that of a man?
Yet for the unfortunate Sabreen Janabi, they are even willing to lay down mohammed's laws and punish 18 police soldiers - who probably weren't the ones who tormented Ms Janabi?
Is Sabreen Janabi their reason or is she merely their excuse?)
Janabi has said she was raped by police officers from the Shi'ite-dominated police force. The government has denied her claims, saying medical records show she was not raped.
(Three possibilities:
1. Islamic government is carrying out mohammed's laws on the value of a woman's witness
2. Government is afraid of repercussions if they admit to it
3. She might have been planted as a rallying-cause for Iraq's Sunnis)
A major Sunni Arab political party later said she was Shi'ite, not Sunni, and that Janabi was a false name.
(Okay, this is getting too confusing.)
In Baghdad, U.S. and Iraqi troops are engaged in a security crackdown to stop bloodshed between Shi'ites and Sunni Arabs.
Sectarian tension was fuelled last month by the reports of rape by the woman in Baghdad and another woman in Tal Afar, in northwest Iraq, who said soldiers raped her.
Sunni Arabs and the United Nations have said the security forces are deeply infiltrated by militias, such as the Mehdi Army, loyal to radical anti-American cleric Moqtada al Sadr.
U.S. and Iraqi military officials said on Thursday troops would soon launch operations to seize weapons and hunt gunmen in the Mehdi Army bastion of Sadr City, signalling resolve to press ahead with the plan even in sensitive areas.
After a relative lull in bombings on Thursday, dozens of loud explosions that sounded like mortar bombs rocked southern Baghdad in quick succession on Thursday evening.
Iraqi military spokesman Brigadier Qassim Moussawi said the blasts were part of the new security offensive, Iraqiya state television reported, without giving details. A U.S. military spokeswoman said she had no information on the explosions.
(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim, Dean Yates and Ibon Villelabeitia)<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->
http://nz.news.yahoo.com/070302/5/3ut.html
<!--QuoteBegin-->QUOTE<!--QuoteEBegin-->Friday March 2, 11:16 PM
<b>14 Iraqi police missing</b>
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Fourteen Iraqi police officers have gone missing and an al Qaeda-linked group on Friday showed pictures of 18 men it said had been kidnapped to avenge the alleged rape of a woman last month.
The al Qaeda-linked group said in an Internet statement it had kidnapped 18 men working for the Interior Ministry in Diyala province, north of Baghdad.
A police source in Diyala said 14 men, including a high ranking officer, left their base in western Baquba around 11 a.m. (0800 GMT) on Thursday to return to their homes in an area called Saadiyet al Shat, north of Baquba.
"Since then nobody has seen them. Their families are calling them, but nobody can reach them," the source said on Friday, adding they were in civilian cars to avoid attention.
Interior Ministry officials in Baghdad said they had no information on the reports of the kidnapping in Diyala.
Diyala is home to Shi'ites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds and has seen relentless bloodshed, including mass kidnappings and ambushes of police at their bases and in convoys. Sunni Arabs in the province say <b>the police are infiltrated by militias</b>.
The Internet statement included photographs showing 18 men, some in uniform and some in civilian clothing, blindfolded in a room. Some of the men had what appeared to be identity papers pinned to their shirts but it was not possible to read them.
"God enabled a group of lions of the <span style='color:blue'>Islamic State in Iraq to detain 18 affiliates of the Interior Ministry in Diyala province," said the statement posted on a Web site often used by radical Islamist groups such as Sunni Arab al Qaeda.</span>
<b>RETALIATION</b>
"This blessed operation came in response to what these apostates are doing in fighting the Sunni folk and the last such act by these treacherous agencies was the rape of our sister ... Sabreen Janabi."
(Wait. Aren't the islamics deviating from the holy laws laid down by allah's mouthpiece mohammed? Isn't it true that in Islam, that great religion famed for its respect of women, the witness of a woman is worth half - or is it quarter - that of a man?
Yet for the unfortunate Sabreen Janabi, they are even willing to lay down mohammed's laws and punish 18 police soldiers - who probably weren't the ones who tormented Ms Janabi?
Is Sabreen Janabi their reason or is she merely their excuse?)
Janabi has said she was raped by police officers from the Shi'ite-dominated police force. The government has denied her claims, saying medical records show she was not raped.
(Three possibilities:
1. Islamic government is carrying out mohammed's laws on the value of a woman's witness
2. Government is afraid of repercussions if they admit to it
3. She might have been planted as a rallying-cause for Iraq's Sunnis)
A major Sunni Arab political party later said she was Shi'ite, not Sunni, and that Janabi was a false name.
(Okay, this is getting too confusing.)
In Baghdad, U.S. and Iraqi troops are engaged in a security crackdown to stop bloodshed between Shi'ites and Sunni Arabs.
Sectarian tension was fuelled last month by the reports of rape by the woman in Baghdad and another woman in Tal Afar, in northwest Iraq, who said soldiers raped her.
Sunni Arabs and the United Nations have said the security forces are deeply infiltrated by militias, such as the Mehdi Army, loyal to radical anti-American cleric Moqtada al Sadr.
U.S. and Iraqi military officials said on Thursday troops would soon launch operations to seize weapons and hunt gunmen in the Mehdi Army bastion of Sadr City, signalling resolve to press ahead with the plan even in sensitive areas.
After a relative lull in bombings on Thursday, dozens of loud explosions that sounded like mortar bombs rocked southern Baghdad in quick succession on Thursday evening.
Iraqi military spokesman Brigadier Qassim Moussawi said the blasts were part of the new security offensive, Iraqiya state television reported, without giving details. A U.S. military spokeswoman said she had no information on the explosions.
(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim, Dean Yates and Ibon Villelabeitia)<!--QuoteEnd--><!--QuoteEEnd-->