Perspective: Baqouba, city of deadly ghosts
Unclaimed bodies at the morgue in Baqouba
Many residents of Baqouba say they live hunkered down in cold, dark houses afraid to go out, that the once mixed Shiite-Sunni neighborhoods are riven by sectarian cleansing, that the police force has virtually collapsed, and that longtime rituals _ like the annual orange festival _ have become unthinkable.
Baqouba is a market center set amid lush orange and date groves about 35 miles north of Baghdad. It is also the capital of Diyala province, abutting Iran. In past years, Shiites and Sunnis abided here in relative peace, until a few months after the ouster of Saddam Hussein, when Sunni insurgents from rural areas began pushing into the city, then about equally divided between Shiites and Sunnis.
In a series of interviews conducted with residents by two Associated Press employees who live in the city but cannot move around freely because of security concerns, and also by telephone from Baghdad, townspeople from both sects gave a bleak assessment of life in Baqouba today.
They describe it as a place where Sunni insurgents signal one another by firing into the air and where in moments a quiet street can be turned into a sectarian hunting ground.
It begins with a pistol shot. Twenty minutes later, masked gunmen carrying automatic rifles march by the dozens through the streets, then set up checkpoints and demand identity cards from anyone who ventures outside. Before Iraqi soldiers or U.S. troops respond, the gunmen usually vanish like ghosts. But not always.
Read the rest at the Washington Post
Baqouba is a market center set amid lush orange and date groves about 35 miles north of Baghdad. It is also the capital of Diyala province, abutting Iran. In past years, Shiites and Sunnis abided here in relative peace, until a few months after the ouster of Saddam Hussein, when Sunni insurgents from rural areas began pushing into the city, then about equally divided between Shiites and Sunnis.
In a series of interviews conducted with residents by two Associated Press employees who live in the city but cannot move around freely because of security concerns, and also by telephone from Baghdad, townspeople from both sects gave a bleak assessment of life in Baqouba today.
They describe it as a place where Sunni insurgents signal one another by firing into the air and where in moments a quiet street can be turned into a sectarian hunting ground.
It begins with a pistol shot. Twenty minutes later, masked gunmen carrying automatic rifles march by the dozens through the streets, then set up checkpoints and demand identity cards from anyone who ventures outside. Before Iraqi soldiers or U.S. troops respond, the gunmen usually vanish like ghosts. But not always.
Read the rest at the Washington Post
posted by iraqnam at 6:17 PM
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