- BAGHDAD -- After the US forces
and the bombings, Iraqis are coming to fear those bands of men in masks
who seem to operate with the Iraqi police.
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- Omar Ahmed's family learnt what it can mean to run into
the police, their supposed protectors. Omar was driving with two friends
in the Adhamiya district of Baghdad at night on September 1 when they were
stopped at a police checkpoint.
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- "The three of them were arrested by the police even
though there was nothing in the car," an eyewitness told Inter Press
Service, speaking on condition of anonymity. They did not return home for
days, and the family began to search the morgues, common practice now when
someone is arrested by the Iraqi police and does not return.
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- "Five days after they were arrested we found Omar's
body in the freezer in a morgue, with holes in the side of his head and
shoulders," a friend of the family said. "We don't know if the
other two men are dead or alive. But we know these men were guilty of nothing
other than driving their car at night. We have no security and the problem
is that police are killing and disappearing the Iraqi people every day
now."
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- The "death squads" as they have come to be
called are getting more active with just a week to go before the December
15 election.
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- On Tuesday this week Iraqi police said they found 20
bodies dumped at two different locations in western Iraq, according to
the al-Sharqiyah television network. Eleven bodies of men wearing civilian
clothes were found dumped on the main road between Baghdad and the Jordanian
border. The bodies were found near al-Rutbah city, with their hands tied
behind their backs. Nine bodies, also of civilians and riddled with bullets,
were found on the side of a road near Fallujah on Monday.
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- Signs are emerging that such killing is the work of death
squads operating with the Iran-backed Shi'ite forces that dominate the
government, and therefore the police.
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- Omar, a 39-year-old unemployed engineer who now sells
petrol and cigarettes on the black market says he survived one such Shi'ite
squad. "I was sleeping on the roof of my house one night because it
was so hot and we had no electricity as usual," Omar said. "I
was awakened by a loud explosion nearby, and immediately surrounded by
strange men wearing night-vision goggles."
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- Omar says he was thrown to the ground by the men, handcuffed
and blindfolded. "They started to beat me using the end of their guns,"
he said. "Then they searched my house, took my gun which I told them
I had, then they took me away." His 32-year-old wife Sumia, a teacher,
was also handcuffed and taken away.
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- Omar says he saw about 10 pick-up trucks carrying at
least 100 men wearing black masks before a bag was placed over his head.
He was taken to the back of a truck, and beaten up until he fainted.
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- Sumia was beaten up too. "I received so many kicks
to my stomach," she said. "I heard screaming in pain, so I fought
until they handcuffed me and beat me until I couldn't do anything else."
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- The two were taken to the Iraqi police station in Suleakh,
Baghdad, where they were interrogated and accused of owning a mortar. "I
explained to them that I don't know anything about mortars," said
Omar. "And that I have never had anything to do with the resistance,
but they said so many insulting words to me, and beat me further."
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- Sumia, who was also interrogated, pleaded with the policemen
to let them return home to care for their young children. "They would
not give me a headscarf to cover my head," she said. "They kept
asking me about mortars and wouldn't let me go to look after my children.
We know nothing about any mortars."
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- Omar said the next morning he was moved into another
room where he saw men lying handcuffed, with their heads covered with sacks.
"They were lying on the ground without a blanket or pillow."
In a while, he saw 14 men wearing black masks enter the room carrying whips.
"I watched them beat the prisoners. They told them this was their
breakfast."
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- Omar and Sumia were later taken home, and warned that
if security forces were attacked in their neighbourhood, they would be
detained again.
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- Omar said the men who detained him and his wife were
members of the Shi'ite Badr Organization, a militia affiliated with Abdel
Aziz al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution
in Iraq. Tensions in Baghdad run high, as people who live in areas not
controlled by the Badr Army face daily threats of being kidnapped or killed
by members of the militia.
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- "The Badr Organization is conducting a campaign
to destroy other political parties and their electoral advertisements,"
said Saleh Hassir, a doctor at a Baghdad medical center. "We see black
paint and tears on ex-prime minister Allawi's posters and those of the
Sunni groups, but pictures of al-Hakim remain unaffected."
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- The doctor says the Americans have helped bring in new
Iran-backed terror.
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- "So many of us are against Iraq being controlled
by these fundamental Islamic Iranian loyalists like al-Hakim," the
doctor said. "Now we are seeing the suffering and ultimate dictatorship
they have brought us here with the help of the Americans."
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- Isam Rashid contributed to this article.
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