Iraqi Hostage Situation Reported
Details Unclear but Iraqi Officials Say Sunni Extremists Are Threatening to Kill Group of Shiites
By Caryle Murphy
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, April 17, 2005; 5:03 PM
BAGHDAD, April 16 -- A group of masked, armed men believed to be Sunni extremists reportedly is threatening to kill a group of Shiite Muslim hostages in a central Iraqi town unless Shiite residents leave their homes, according to a police officer and Shiite Muslim officials.
Many details of the apparently still-evolving situation in Mada'in, a town about 30 southeast of Baghdad, remain unclear, including the number of alleged hostages, how and when they were seized, and how Iraqi police and armed forces are responding.
But in a sign of concern over the incident's effect on rising sectarian tensions, Shiite Muslim political and religious leaders have called for calm. They also are demanding that acting Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and other top officials address the situation when the National Assembly meets Sunday.
Mada'in has a mixed population of both Sunni and Shiite Muslim families. But there, as elsewhere in Iraq, tensions between the two groups have worsened as the predominantly Sunni insurgency that is battling U.S. and Iraqi military forces has also targeted Shiite civilians. The latest events in Mada'in come amid an uptick in violence following a period of relative calm in the last two months.
The situation in Mada'in "is very bad, everyone is scared," said Ali Dabbagh, a spokesman for the predominantly Shiite Muslim political coalition, the United Iraqi Alliance, which has asked for an official report to parliament.
"We feel this is an important issue and has threatened the political process," added Dabbagh.
Sabah Kadhim, a spokesman for the Interior Ministry, said he could not confirm the reports of hostage-taking because "the communications were so bad today we could not contact our police or the officials" in Mada'in. He said the ministry had sent police commandos to the farming town.
Dabbagh said residents of Mada'in told the alliance that 60 hostages were taken from a Shiite mosque, and that the mosque was damaged by a bomb. Other sources said the number of hostages was in the range of a dozen.
Haytham Mohamed Ali, 34, a police captain in Salman Pak, a town near Mada'in, was in Mada'in Saturday and told The Washington Post that armed, masked men driving three pickup trucks and an Opel used loud speakers on Friday to threaten Shiites, telling them to leave the town within 48 hours "because we cannot be patient any more with you being agents and spy for the occupiers."
They threatened to kill more than 60 Shiite male hostages, Mohamed said, adding that 13 Shiite families had fled the town.
Haitham Al Hassani, a spokesman for Abdul Aziz Hakim, head of the Supreme Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), said that on Thursday Sunni extremists in Mada'in "blew up" the Shiite mosque Al Rasool Al Adham. The situation "deteriorated further" Friday, he added, when "a large number of armed men took some hostages."
Similar reports reached Najaf, the holy city of Shiite Muslims about 90 miles south of Baghdad, where about 20 families from Mada'in have taken refuge, according to Sheikh Ali Bashir Najafi, the son and spokesman for senior Shiite cleric Bashir Najafi.
Najafi added that the extremists doing such things "are not Iraqis. This kind of act is shameful and against the unity of the country and we stress the right of all Iraqis to live together. The Sunnis and Shiites are brothers."
A man in Najaf who gave his name only as Abu Jassim, or Father of Jassim, told The Post that he had left Mada'in earlier this week with his seven children because the extremists, who are residents of the town, "told us if you don't leave we will destroy the whole family.
"We have no power in that place because most of the people are Sunnis and Wahhabis," he added. "They have the doctrine of fighting the Iraqi government, the American forces and the Shias because the Shias do not fight them."
Filing from Mada'in Saturday, Reuter reporter Waleed Ibrahim wrote that no U.S. or Iraqi forces could be seen in the town, where masked extremists with AK-47 rifles appeared to move about freely.
Two U.S. soldiers died Saturday in separate attacks, the U.S. military said. A member of the 42nd Military Police Brigade died of wounds received Friday morning when a roadside bomb exploded on a military convoy near Taji, about 12 miles north of Baghdad. The second soldier died of injuries sustained Friday night when a military base was attacked by indirect fire near Tikrit, about 75 miles north of Baghdad.
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