World

14 Killed, 14 Kidnapped In Iraq

October 3, 2006 / 8:18 AM EDT / CBS/AP

At least 14 people were killed Monday in attacks in Iraq, while authorities found more mutilated bodies in and around Baghdad — likely victims of the sectarian death squads — and 14 people were kidnapped in the capital.

The headless bodies of seven people were turned in to the Kut
morgue, morgue spokesman Hadi al-Itabi said. The bodies were found Sunday in Suwayrah, 25 miles south of Baghdad.

In eastern Baghdad, the bodies of two more people were found, police said. They had been shot, their arms and legs bound, and showed signs of torture.

Already in the 24-hour period into Monday morning, a total of 50
bodies, all shot and some with signs of torture, had been found in
the capital, said police 1st Lt. Thair Mahmoud.

Later Monday, gunmen kidnapped 14 workers from computer shops in front of Baghdad's Technical University, the second mass kidnapping in as many days in the capital. Seven cars carrying armed men broke into the shops and seized the employees, Mahmoud said.

On Sunday evening, 26 workers at a food factory in Baghdad were kidnapped. Similar mass kidnappings in the past have been blamed on either Sunni extremists or Shiite death squads.

In other developments:

Iraq's prime minister announced a new four-point plan aimed at uniting the sharply divided Shiite and Sunni parties in his government behind stopping rampant sectarian violence. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki emerged with the plan after talks with the top Sunni and Shiite leaders in his government, trying to stanch a potential crisis over the sectarian divisions. Under the plan, local commissions will be formed in each district of Baghdad, made up of representatives of each party, to oversee security forces' efforts against violence, al-Maliki said.

The Iraqi parliament voted Monday to extend the country's state of emergency for an additional 30 days. The state of emergency has been renewed every month since first being authorized in November 2004. It grants security forces greater powers and affects the entire country apart from the autonomous Kurdish region in the north. The measure allows for a nighttime curfew and gives the government extra powers to make arrests without warrants and carry out police and military operations.

A lawmaker in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's party on Monday criticized Syria's decision to move troops from the Iraqi border to reinforce its border with Lebanon, saying it would make it easier for terrorists to pass into Iraq. Abdul Karim al-Inazi, a Shiite lawmaker with the prime minister's Dawa Party and a former minister of state for national security, said the "Syrian government should do its best to control the borders with Iraq."

The vast majority of Australians do not believe their country's involvement in Iraq has helped reduce the threat of terrorism, according to a poll published Monday. The annual poll, published by the independent think tank Lowy Institute for International Policy, found 84 percent of Australians do not believe the Iraq war has diminished the chance of future terrorist attacks. The results were in line with a recent, similar poll conducted in the United States, which showed that a majority of Americans believe the war has made them no safer.

In comments on CNN's "Late Edition" on Sunday, U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad said al Qaeda-linked militants had been
weakened in recent months and that "a main part of the violence
now is sectarian violence ... between death squads associated with
militias." He said the Iraqi government "in the course of the next two months, has to make progress in terms of containing sectarian violence."

Four people were killed and 13 wounded in a roadside bombing in
Baghdad's downtown Al-Nasir Square around midday, police said.
Elsewhere, gunmen ambushed a police patrol in southern Iraq, killing two officers and injuring three. The ambush came in the al-Hay area, some 140 miles south of Baghdad, said police Lt. Mohammed al-Shimri.

An Iraqi army officer was killed and two were injured in the western Baghdad neighborhood of Yarmouk when a roadside bomb exploded next to their patrol, police said.

Another roadside bomb in northeastern Baghdad injured three civilians, while a later bomb blast in the capital killed one policemen and one civilian while wounding seven people.

In Basra, 340 miles southeast of Baghdad, Capt. Nabil Kamil al-Tamimi, director for Iraqi military intelligence in the area, was shot and killed as he was leaving his home, Police Capt. Mushtaq Talib said.

In central Baghdad, two young men were found suffering from
multiple gunshot wounds and died on arrival at the hospital, police
said.

One civilian died in a drive-by shooting in an area south of Hillah, about 60 miles south of Baghdad, police said.

Early in the afternoon, a policeman in Mosul was killed by three
unidentified gunmen in a drive-by shooting, police said.

Late Sunday, insurgents fired mortar rounds at British targets at the Shat Al-Arab hotel in Basra, police said. One landed on a nearby home, killing a 7-year-old boy and his 3-year-old sister and wounding a third child.

One British soldier was killed and another injured in the attack, said British military spokesman Maj. Charlie Burbridge.