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AT LEAST
21 people were killed in the latest in a renewed
spree of attacks to hit Iraq, as a top UN official
issued a stark warning that elections could not be
held in the current climate of violence.
The deadly attacks, which added to the grim toll of
40 people killed in violence the day earlier,
included the gunning down of 17 Iraqis employed by a
US contractor while on their way to work.
Lakhdar Brahami, a special advisor to UN Secretary
General Kofi Annan and until recently his top envoy
in Iraq, said the landmark January 30 vote "could
only take place "if first and foremost security
improves."
The rush of attacks in recent days has shattered the
relative calm that had descended on the Iraqi
capital and elsewhere following the US-led assault
to crush insurgents in the Sunni city of Fallujah
last month.
The United States has been forced to increase by
early January the number of troops to about 150,000
from 138,000, the highest number since it declared
an end to major combat, in a bid to ensure the
election process runs smoothly.
Violence over the weekend has also claimed the lives
of four US soldiers.
On Friday, 26 Iraqis were killed in attacks in
Baghdad while another four policemen lost their
lives in double suicide car bombs in the capital on
Saturday.
In Sunday's violence, the US military said the 17
employees in Tikrit lost their lives when men in two
pick-ups attacked the civilian buses they were
travelling in with small arms fire.
Three members of the Iraqi national guard, including
a regional commander, were also killed in a car bomb
attack near the town of Baiji, just north of Tikrit,
toppled Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein's home town.
In Samarra, south of Tikrit, one Iraqi soldier was
killed and four were wounded when insurgents
attacked their patrol with rocket-propelled grenades
and small arms fire.
The fledgling Iraqi police force and civilians
working for the US military and companies have
become the favourite targets of insurgents, who
claim to have regropued in other cities following
their defeat in Fallujah
The attacks were the latest example of instability
in the oil-rich north of Iraq, where insurgent
activity has so far been focused on the third city
of Mosul.
The day earlier in Mosul, 17 Kurdish militiamen,
known as Peshmergas, were killed when their convoy
was rammed by a suicide bomber in a car close to the
headquarters of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan
party.
Mosul is rife with ethnic tension between its
Kurdish and Arab communities. After Saddam fell from
power in 2003, Kurdish political parties set up
offices there, guarded by peshmergas.
Meanwhile, the US military said two of its soldiers
were killed and four wounded when their patrol was
shot at in Mosul on Saturday.
Despite stressing his comments were in a personal
capacity, Brahimi's remarks on the difficulty of
holding polls will further raise concerns about
whether the Iraqi elections can go ahead as planned.
Political parties, including that of Prime Minister
Iyad Allawi, have already called for a six month
delay to the elections, but the government and the
United States has insisted they will go ahead as
planned.
But the highly-respected Brahimi told the Dutch
newspaper NRC Handelsblad in an interview that if
the elections were to take place in Iraq's secure
areas it would exclude the Sunni Muslim minority
living in more tense regions.
"The situation does not work. We have to find
something which does. If we let the situation get
even worse, it will just become more dangerous."
In Germany, two Iraqis arrested on suspicion of
plotting an attack against Allawi during his visit
to the country were remanded in custody Saturday. An
investigating judge continued to question a third
suspect.
The three men, believed to be members of the Islamic
extremist group Ansar al-Islam, were arrested on
Friday after early morning raids in three German
cities.
A British regiment of 850 soldiers deployed on a
controversial mission to back up US forces outside
Baghdad since the end of October has returned to its
base in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.
A convoy of some 200 vehicles carrying men mostly
from Scotland's Black Watch regiment arrived back in
Shaiba outside Basra, the defence ministry said.
Numerous observers in Britain saw the redeployment,
barely a week before US elections, as a sop to
President George W. Bush by the prime minister, his
main ally in the Iraq campaign.
This special British mission has ended, but analysts
say it is likely Washington will call on London
again before planned elections at the end of next
month to help out by sending its soldiers to
US-controlled areas of Iraq.
"When US forces are under pressure again, they are
going to go straight to the UK and say we want your
people as quickly as possible, and the UK will
almost certainly deliver," Charles Heymann of Jane's
Defence Weekly said
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