DEVELOPMENTS
— Security at the U.S. Embassy in Baghdad was bolstered and some staff members were being moved out of Iraq’s capital as it was threatened by the advance of an al-Qaida inspired insurgency.
— Insurgents set off two bombs in separate incidents in central Baghdad on Sunday, killing as many as 19 people, witnesses said, and breaking a recent although brief lull in attacks in Iraq’s capital city.
— As they return to nuclear talks in Vienna today, U.S. and Iranian diplomats are taking care to prevent the upheaval in Iraq from creating another complication for their high-priority negotiations. Both countries have a mutual interest in preventing the collapse of the Iraqi government
News services
The Islamic militants who overran cities and towns in Iraq last week posted graphic photos that appeared to show their gunmen massacring scores of captured Iraqi soldiers, while the prime minister vowed Sunday to “liberate every inch” of captured territory.
The pictures on a militant website appear to show masked fighters of the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant, or ISIL, loading the captives onto flatbed trucks before forcing them to lie face-down in a shallow ditch with their arms tied behind their backs. The final images show the bodies of the captives soaked in blood after being shot.
Chief military spokesman Lt. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi confirmed the photos’ authenticity and said he was aware of cases of mass murder of captured Iraqi soldiers in areas held by ISIL. He said an examination of the images by military experts showed that about 170 soldiers were shot to death by the militants after their capture.
Captions on the photos showing the soldiers after they were shot say “hundreds have been liquidated,” but the total could not immediately be verified.
If the claim is true, it would be the worst mass atrocity in either Syria or Iraq in recent years, surpassing even the chemical weapons attacks in the Syrian suburbs of Damascus last year, which killed 1,400 people and were attributed to the Syrian government.
The latest attack would also raise the specter of the war in Iraq turning genocidal, particularly because the insurgents boasted that their victims were all Shiites. There were also fears it could usher in a series of reprisal killings of Shiites and Sunnis, like those seen in the Iraq War in 2005-07.
The grisly images also could sap the morale of Iraq’s security forces, but they could also heighten sectarian tensions. Thousands of Shiites are already heeding a call from their most revered spiritual leader to take up arms against the Sunni militants who have swept across the north in the worst instability in Iraq since the U.S. withdrawal in 2011.
ISIL has vowed to take the battle to Baghdad and cities farther south housing revered Shiite shrines.
Although the government bolstered defenses around Baghdad, a series of explosions inside the capital Sunday killed at least 19 people and wounded more than 40, police and hospital officials said.
Security at the U.S. Embassy was strengthened, and some staff members sent elsewhere in Iraq and to neighboring Jordan, the State Department said.
U.S. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said in a statement that much of the embassy staff will remain even as parts of Iraq experience instability and violence.
“Overall, a substantial majority of the U.S. Embassy presence in Iraq will remain in place and the embassy will be fully equipped to carry out its national security mission,” she said.
Some staff was temporarily moved elsewhere in Iraq and to Jordan, she said.
In a fiery speech to volunteers south of Baghdad, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki vowed to regain territory captured last week by the ISIL.
“We will march and liberate every inch they defaced, from the country’s northernmost point to the southernmost point,” he said. The volunteers responded with Shiite chants.
Armed police, including SWAT teams, were seen at checkpoints in Baghdad, searching vehicles and checking drivers’ documents. Security was particularly tightened on the northern and western approaches, the likely targets of ISIL fighters on the capital.
The city looked gloomy Sunday, with thin traffic and few shoppers in commercial areas. At one popular park along the Tigris River, only a fraction of the thousands who usually head there were present in the evening. In the commercial Karada district in central Baghdad, many of the sidewalk hawkers who sell anything from shoes to toys and clothes were absent.
According to police and hospital officials, a car bomb in the city center killed 10 and wounded 21. After nightfall, another explosion hit the area, killing two and wounding five. A third went off near a falafel shop in the sprawling Sadr City district, killing three and wounding seven. And late Sunday, a fourth blast in the northern Sulaikh district killed four and wounded 12. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity.
Suicide and car bombings in recent months have mostly targeting Shiite neighborhoods or security forces.
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