Patrick Cockburn: "Ethnic civil war rages through Iraq "

[leftchick]

Mr. Cockburn is truly courageous in reporting this story. It is a must read.....

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/story.cfm?c_id=2&ObjectID=10402824


1.00pm Monday September 25, 2006
By Patrick Cockburn


Civil war is raging through the Iraqi countryside.

Sunni insurgents have largely taken control of the province of Diyala, where local leaders believe the insurgents are close to establishing a 'Taleban republic'. Officials in the strategically important, mixed Sunni and Shia province with a Kurdish minority, have no doubt about what is happening.

Lt Col Ahmed Ahmed Nuri Hassan, a weary looking commander of the federal police, says: "Now there is an ethnic civil war and it is getting worse every day."

At the moment the Sunni seem to be winning it. As the violence has escalated in Iraq over the past three years it has become too dangerous for journalists to find out what is happening in the provinces outside the capital.

<snip>

In Diyala it is possible to see the anguished break up of Iraq at ground level.

Going by the accounts of police and government officials in the province given to the Independent the death toll outside Baghdad may be far higher than previously reported.

[ShortnFiery]

1. We've lost all possibility of making this work. Extract the troops NOW!

:nuke: Sooner or later, the chinooks will extract the troops. Better sooner than later. :grr:

[leftchick]

2. it will be much later

I just read the army is considering sending in more combat troops. Q U A G M I R E !

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20060925/pl_afp/usiraqmilitarytroops