November 14, 2006

Mass Kidnapping in Iraq

I fear this will not end well. If history is any guide, this will turn out to be the work of Sunni terrorists who consider all who work for the Iraqi government 'apostates'. Apostasy is a capital offense under Islamic law.

But the Education Minister is Sunni, so it is possible that this is the work of Shia. However, this would be the first time I have heard of a Shia group engaging in mass hostage taking.

I'm disgusted by Democratic calls for withdrawal from Iraq based on the idea that somehow leaving would mean the Iraqi's would pick up the slack. As if Iraqis aren't already dying every day fighting terrorist forces in their own country.

A couple of days ago the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq, after hearing about Democratic plans for withdrawal, said he was surprised that the U.S. was planning to leave Iraq so soon. He thought it would take a lot longer to defeat the Americans. He was wrong.

AKI:

Violence-weary Iraq was shocked on Tuesday by an ambitious mass kidnapping in which armed men, masquerading as police, seized more than 100 people from a higher education ministry building in the capital....

A ministry spokeswoman said the gunmen arrived in new pick-up trucks and stormed the ministry's Research Directorate in the religiously-mixed Karrada district at around 9.30 am. They reportedly ordered the women into one room and abducted all the men, including employees, guards and visitors.

The men were then taken into the car park of the Sunni-led ministry, handcuffed and forced into cars before being driven away. One report said that Sunnis and Shias had been divided, but other eyewitnesses say this was not so....

"This morning a large force arrived with many vehicles with tinted windows claiming to be police commandos and they clashed with the guards and then entered the building and snatched all the employees and some visitors," Higher Education Minister, Abed Dhiab al-Ujaili, a Sunni member of the Iraqi National Accord told Iraqi state television.

By Rusty Shackleford, Ph.D. at 09:37 AM | |