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Iraq suffers bloody day of assassinations and recounts { February 9 2005 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9950-2005Feb9.htmlhttp://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/articles/A9950-2005Feb9.html
Iraq Suffers Bloody Day of Assassinations
Recount of 300 Ballot Boxes Puts Timing of Final Election Results in Doubt
By William Branigin
Washington Post Staff Writer
Wednesday, February 9, 2005; 1:40 PM
Gunmen in Iraq carried out a series of assassinations in different parts of the country today, killing an Iraqi journalist who worked for a U.S.-funded Arabic television network, a senior Housing Ministry official and three Kurdish political party members.
In addition, a senior Interior Ministry official was abducted from his car in Baghdad, and the U.S. military disclosed the deaths of two soldiers in northern Iraq.
The latest violence came as Iraq's Independent Electoral Commission announced that final results from the landmark Jan. 30 elections would be delayed because officials need to recount the votes from about 300 ballot boxes. The final results were scheduled to be made public Thursday. It was not immediately clear when the recount would be completed and the final tally announced.
In the southern city of Basra, gunmen killed Abdul Hussein Khazal, a journalist for the Virginia-based al-Hurra satellite television network, and his 3-year-old son as they were leaving their home, officials said. The network was launched in February 2004 to compete with other Arabic-language news networks such as the Dubai-headquartered al-Arabiya and the Qatar-based al-Jazeera -- outlets that some U.S. officials have criticized as purveyors of anti-American propaganda.
Khazal, 40, was politically active, working for the Shiite Muslim Dawa Party and serving as head of the press office at the Basra City Council, the Associated Press reported. He also was the editor of a local Basra newspaper.
In Baghdad, a director in the Ministry of Housing was assassinated by gunmen who attacked his car, Reuters news agency reported.
Earlier assailants killed three members of the Kurdistan Democratic Party in an ambush in the capital's Haifa Street neighborhood, a stronghold of insurgents fighting the interim government and U.S. forces in Iraq, the agency reported. Radical Sunni Muslim rebels also have targeted members of the country's Shiite Muslim majority, ethnic Kurds, Iraqi Christians and foreigners in general.
The most wanted insurgent in Iraq, Jordanian terrorist Abu Musab Zarqawi, claimed responsibility for the ambush, the third attack in as many days. His group, affiliated with the al-Qaeda terrorist network of Osama bin Laden, also claimed to have carried out a suicide bombing on Tuesday that killed at least 21 people waiting in line for recruitment into Iraq's security forces, as well as suicide attacks Monday that were aimed at police in Mosul and Baqubah and left at least 27 Iraqis dead.
According to the Interior Ministry, a colonel who worked in the operations department, Riyadh Katei Aliwi, was dragged from his car in Baghdad today and taken away by unknown assailants. There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the abduction.
In a brief statement, the U.S. military said today that a soldier was killed by small-arms fire while on patrol in the northern city of Mosul around 11 a.m. on Feb. 6. No other details were provided. The military also said a soldier with the 1st Corps Support Command died as the result of a gunshot wound around 1 p.m. Tuesday at Logistics Support Area Anaconda near the town of Balad. The military said the incident is under investigation.
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld, meanwhile, told sailors on a destroyer off the French Riviera that the United States faces "more difficulties" in Iraq.
Before arriving in Nice to attend an informal meeting of NATO defense ministers, Rumsfeld told crew members aboard the USS O'Bannon, "I wish I could assure you that everything was going to turn out well, but I can't. I suspect that there are going to be more people killed, that there'll be more difficulties, that it will be a bumpy road, a tough road."
He added that no country has ever made a smooth transition from dictatorship to democracy. He said the world needs moderate Muslim leaders to help fight extremism, and he predicted, "We'll have new leadership in Iraq that will be moderate Muslim leadership, in my view."
Partial results for the Iraqi elections released Monday showed a Shiite Muslim coalition with a large lead, followed by an alliance of Kurdish parties. Trailing in third place was the ticket of interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi. Since then, no new results have been made public.
In announcing the delay today, election officials said a number of ballots were declared invalid because of alleged tampering and that the votes from about 300 ballot boxes must be recounted.
The ballots were inside 40 boxes and another 250 bags that were delivered to the central counting facility in Baghdad, the Associated Press reported. Officials would not say where the ballots originated.
© 2005 The Washington Post Company
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