More sectarian death squad victims found in Iraq

At least five people were killed today in attacks in Iraq, while authorities continued to find more mutilated bodies in and around Baghdad – likely victims of the sectarian death squads that roam the capital area.

The headless bodies of seven people were turned in to the Kut morgue, said morgue spokesman Hadi al-Itabi. The bodies were found yesterday in Suwayrah, 25 miles south of Baghdad.

And in eastern Baghdad, the bodies of two more people were found, police said. They had been shot, their arms and legs bound, and showed signs of torture.

Already in the 24-hour period into this morning, a total of 50 bodies, all shot and some with signs of torture, had been found in the capital, said police 1st Lt. Thayer Mahmoud.

In comments on CNN’s Late Edition yesterday, US Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said al Qaida-linked militants had been weakened in recent months and that “a main part of the violence now is sectarian violence … between death squads associated with militias”.

He said the Iraqi government “in the course of the next two months, has to make progress in terms of containing sectarian violence”.

Elsewhere, a police patrol was ambushed in southern Iraq by gunmen who killed two officers and injured three. The ambush came in the al-Hay area, some 140 miles south of Baghdad, said police Lt. Mohammed al-Shimri.

An Iraqi army officer was killed and two were injured in the western Baghdad neighbourhood of Yarmouk when a roadside bomb exploded next to their patrol, police said.

Another roadside bomb in north-eastern Baghdad injured three civilians.

Two young men were found suffering from multiple gunshot wounds in central Baghdad and died on arrival at the hospital, police said.

Late yesterday, insurgents fired mortar rounds at British targets at the Shat Al-Arab hotel in Basra, police said. One landed on a nearby home, killing a seven-year-old boy and his three-year-old sister and wounding a third child.