Bodies of 49 Iraqi soldiers found

As I said in a short
statement,that this is a massacre. I suppose that the U.S will now hit back with attacks to Baquba or again Falluja.

Reuters account:


Bodies of 49 Iraqi Soldiers Found Shot Dead
Sun Oct 24, 2004 05:27 AM ET



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BAQUBA, Iraq (Reuters) - The bodies of 49 soldiers of Iraq's fledgling army have been found shot dead northeast of Baghdad, police and officials said on Sunday.
They said 37 bodies had been recovered on Saturday and another 12 on Sunday morning on a road near the village of Mandali, near the Iranian border.

Police said insurgents appeared to have intercepted the soldiers as they were traveling home on leave and forced them to lie on the ground before shooting them.

"They were all executed, we found them executed," Interior Ministry spokesman Adnan Abdul-Rahman said.

He said the soldiers had been traveling in three minibuses, which were all burned-out wrecks after the attack.

The soldiers were based at Kirkush, about 55 miles northeast of Baghdad.

A senior security official, who asked not to be named, said the soldiers were unarmed and wearing civilian clothes. They were mostly from the mainly Shi'ite Muslim cities of Basra, Amara and Nassiriya in southern Iraq.

"It appears that they were ambushed by a large, well- organized force with good intelligence," the source said.

The attack was another blow to the efforts of the interim government to develop Iraqi security forces to tackle a raging insurgency that U.S.-led forces have failed to quell.

CNN reports,that there are 51 Iraqi soldiers.

More from NYT: http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/25/international/middleeast/25iraq.html?ex=1256443200&en=b361d02918bad77b&ei=5088&partner=rssnyt

Ambush Kills 50 Iraq Soldiers Execution Style
By EDWARD WONG

Published: October 25, 2004


BAGHDAD, Iraq, Oct. 24 - In the deadliest ambush of the insurgency, guerrillas dressed as policemen killed about 50 freshly trained Iraqi soldiers in remote eastern Iraq as the unarmed soldiers were heading home on leave Saturday evening, Iraqi officials said Sunday.

The soldiers were taken from three minibuses at a fake checkpoint about 95 miles northeast of Baghdad, near the Iranian border in restive Diyala Province, police officials said. They were told or forced to lie down on the ground in rows, then killed mostly with bullets to their heads.

The ambush, extraordinarily ambitious in scope and violence, showed a high level of organization, and the insurgents probably had inside information on the travel plans of the soldiers, who were members of the nascent Iraqi National Guard, officials said.

The mass killing deals a severe blow to the American military and the interim Iraqi government at a time when top officials say Iraqi forces are being quickly trained to take over policing duties from the 138,000 American troops here and to help maintain security for general elections scheduled in January.

On Sunday night, a group called Al Qaeda in Mesopotamia, the new name of the militant band led by Jordanian fighter Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, claimed responsibility in an Internet posting.

In Baghdad, a State Department security officer, Edward J. Seitz, was killed Sunday morning by a mortar or rocket attack at Camp Victory, the American base next to Baghdad International Airport that serves as the military's operations center, said Bob Callahan, a spokesman for the American Embassy. Mr. Seitz, a 16-year veteran of the State Department who was posted at the base, is the first American diplomatic employee known to have been killed in the war.

Elsewhere, Moktada al-Sadr, the firebrand Shiite Muslim cleric who has led two uprisings against the occupation, said he fully supported the leaders of the insurgent stronghold of Falluja, which could face invasion within weeks by the United States Marines.

Mr. Sadr said in a statement issued late Saturday night that he was ready to intervene in the standoff, and that he backed the leaders in Falluja whether they decided to reach a peace agreement with the Americans and the Iraqi government or take up arms. "No mercy to the occupiers, and the resistance will continue, God willing," he said.

His incendiary words came as his aides have been saying he has been trying to disarm his thousands-strong militia, the Mahdi Army, and enter mainstream politics in advance of the January elections. In April, Mr. Sadr told his militia to wage war on the Americans at the same time that the Marines staged an ill-fated assault on Falluja, creating a two-front revolt that led to one of the biggest crises of the occupation.

His statement raised the possibility that a similar eruption could take place if the Marines invaded again, though an aide, Hashim Abu Rejaf, said in an interview that Mr. Sadr was just lending "moral support" for now. Mr. Sadr favors a peaceful solution, Mr. Rejaf said, especially as elections approach.

Still, Mr. Sadr's message could be interpreted as a call to arms by some in the Mahdi Army, which is loosely organized and made up mostly of poor, undisciplined young men.

On Sunday morning, a delegation of leaders from Falluja drove to Baghdad to meet with Iraqi Defense Ministry officials to resume negotiations.

Later, an American fighter jet attacked a suspected insurgent post in Falluja, the latest in a series of almost daily airstrikes by the Marines. Witnesses said six people had been killed, The Associated Press reported.

The executions of the Iraqi soldiers on Saturday evening - and what may also have been three civilian drivers in their convoy - raised disturbing questions about the training process and the recruits: Why were the guardsmen allowed to travel unarmed and without protection, given the frequent attacks on the Iraqi security forces? Why did men trained as soldiers not put up a fight, especially when there were so many of them? How did the insurgents get police uniforms and information on the travel plans of the soldiers?

Iraqi and American officials said they had no immediate answers.

Again:
Militants claim killings of 11 Iraqi soldiers.