Shia and Sunni leaders sparred today over a government order to lift US checkpoints around a Baghad militia stronghold as data showed the number of Iraqis killed in October may have hit a record high.
Iraqi Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi
US troops yesterday lifted roadblocks around the Shia slum district of Sadr City when Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki ordered them out, flexing his political muscle after a week of public friction with Washington ahead of US elections.
Supporters of anti-American Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr celebrated in the streets of Sadr City, bastion of his Mehdi Army. An aide hailed the end of a "barbaric siege" begun to help find a kidnapped US soldier possibly being held by militiamen.
But Iraq's Sunni vice president slammed the move, saying it could spell an end to a lull in sectarian death squad violence, which the once dominant Sunni minority blames on the Mehdi Army.
"I'm afraid that by lifting the siege the government sent the wrong message to those who stand behind terrorism in Iraq. It says the iron fist will loosen and they can move freely," said Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi, a Sunni.
Khaled al-Attiya, the Shiadeputy speaker of parliament, said militias were not the main problem: "All the militias will disband at the end of the day but these are not the main enemy of the Iraqi people," he said.
"The main enemy are the Baathists and Saddamists who want to destroy the political process and the main principles of the constitution."
US President George W. Bush's Republicans risk losing control of Congress next week when Americans vote in a ballot dominated by arguments over whether to keep 150,000 US troops in harm's way as Iraq descends ever closer to all-out civil war.
Yesterday's death of a US soldier in the western Anbar province took the US fatality toll in October at least to 104, the highest in nearly two years.
Data obtained from the Interior Ministry today indicated the number of Iraqi civilians killed in violence may have risen to another record high in October.