ShotOver
01-02-2004, 12:48 PM
AFP - Ethnic violence claimed the lives of two Kurds and an Arab in the tense oil centre of Kirkuk as Iraqis were gripped by fear of more bombings in the wake of a deadly New Year's Eve attack on a Baghdad restaurant.
Two Kurds were found stabbed to death in the volatile northern city of Kirkuk and an Arab was killed in clashes with police in the violence which flared a day after three people died in ethnic clashes.
The deaths in the north came as the toll in a car bomb attack on a popular Baghdad restaurant packed with New Year's Eve revellers rose to eight, prompting fears that insurgents were now turning to civilian targets.
Meanwhile, the US military announced the arrest of an Iraqi "high value target" believed to have been smuggling foreign fighters into Iraq from Syria, in addition to the capture of 10 Muslim fundamentalists.
In Kirkuk, simmering tensions reached boiling point on Wednesday when fighting broke out between Kurdish fighters from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Arab and Turkmen demonstrators. Further violence followed on Thursday.
"Unknown attackers stabbed two Kurds to death and threw their bodies near a bridge in the centre of the city," Kirkuk police chief Turhan Yussef said.
A Sunni Muslim Arab man was killed and two others injured by security forces in the south of the city where armed Arabs and Turkmen were trying to attack Kurdish targets, Yussef's deputy Sirzad Rifaat Kader said.
Several other people, including a police officer, were also wounded during armed confrontations in the Al-Uruba district of the city, and police have called for reinforcements from the US military that controls Iraq.
Tensions have been running high between Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen in the city of almost one million people since the fall of Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein's regime in April.
About 2,000 Turkmen and Sunni Arabs staged a protest Wednesday against a push by the city's Kurdish majority to incorporate it into an autonomous Kurdish province but the event soon turned violent.
Three people were killed and 31 injured by shots said to have been fired by gunmen from the PUK, although the group's Kirkuk chief Jalal Jawhar blamed Saddam loyalists.
A senior KUP official who declined to be identified said leaders of the three communities met late Thursday to try to calm the situation, blaming the trouble on extremists.
Last week, thousands of Kurds took to the streets of Kirkuk to lay claim to the city where Saddam's regime settled large numbers of Arabs from the 1970s.
Across Iraq, US troops have been on high alert since the capture of Saddam three weeks ago. The restaurant attack in Baghdad's Karrada district on New Year's Eve came amid an aggressive US operation to root out insurgents.
Karrada has been hit by two roadside bombs in the past few days that killed five Iraqis, two of them children.
On Christmas Day a wave of attacks targeted a major hotel, three embassies and the heavily fortified headquarters compound of the coalition, although there were no deaths.
The Christian-owned Narbil restaurant, which serves alcohol and often brings in belly dancers for customers, is popular with both Westerners and the Iraqi elite. Three Los Angeles Times journalists were among the injured.
The US military meanwhile suffered minor setbacks as a truck flipped near Baghdad killing one soldier and injuring six others and an Army Blackhawk helicopter made an emergency landing, leaving one soldier injured.
İAAP 2003
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/World/story_51882.asp
Two Kurds were found stabbed to death in the volatile northern city of Kirkuk and an Arab was killed in clashes with police in the violence which flared a day after three people died in ethnic clashes.
The deaths in the north came as the toll in a car bomb attack on a popular Baghdad restaurant packed with New Year's Eve revellers rose to eight, prompting fears that insurgents were now turning to civilian targets.
Meanwhile, the US military announced the arrest of an Iraqi "high value target" believed to have been smuggling foreign fighters into Iraq from Syria, in addition to the capture of 10 Muslim fundamentalists.
In Kirkuk, simmering tensions reached boiling point on Wednesday when fighting broke out between Kurdish fighters from the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and Arab and Turkmen demonstrators. Further violence followed on Thursday.
"Unknown attackers stabbed two Kurds to death and threw their bodies near a bridge in the centre of the city," Kirkuk police chief Turhan Yussef said.
A Sunni Muslim Arab man was killed and two others injured by security forces in the south of the city where armed Arabs and Turkmen were trying to attack Kurdish targets, Yussef's deputy Sirzad Rifaat Kader said.
Several other people, including a police officer, were also wounded during armed confrontations in the Al-Uruba district of the city, and police have called for reinforcements from the US military that controls Iraq.
Tensions have been running high between Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen in the city of almost one million people since the fall of Iraqi strongman Saddam Hussein's regime in April.
About 2,000 Turkmen and Sunni Arabs staged a protest Wednesday against a push by the city's Kurdish majority to incorporate it into an autonomous Kurdish province but the event soon turned violent.
Three people were killed and 31 injured by shots said to have been fired by gunmen from the PUK, although the group's Kirkuk chief Jalal Jawhar blamed Saddam loyalists.
A senior KUP official who declined to be identified said leaders of the three communities met late Thursday to try to calm the situation, blaming the trouble on extremists.
Last week, thousands of Kurds took to the streets of Kirkuk to lay claim to the city where Saddam's regime settled large numbers of Arabs from the 1970s.
Across Iraq, US troops have been on high alert since the capture of Saddam three weeks ago. The restaurant attack in Baghdad's Karrada district on New Year's Eve came amid an aggressive US operation to root out insurgents.
Karrada has been hit by two roadside bombs in the past few days that killed five Iraqis, two of them children.
On Christmas Day a wave of attacks targeted a major hotel, three embassies and the heavily fortified headquarters compound of the coalition, although there were no deaths.
The Christian-owned Narbil restaurant, which serves alcohol and often brings in belly dancers for customers, is popular with both Westerners and the Iraqi elite. Three Los Angeles Times journalists were among the injured.
The US military meanwhile suffered minor setbacks as a truck flipped near Baghdad killing one soldier and injuring six others and an Army Blackhawk helicopter made an emergency landing, leaving one soldier injured.
İAAP 2003
http://news.ninemsn.com.au/World/story_51882.asp