Friday, March 23, 2007
INM daily summary – 23 March 2007
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- The Islamic State of Iraq denied responsibility for the chlorine truck bombs in Fallujah on March 16 and threatened Al-Anbar tribes who have joined the “al-Anbar savior council” in the fight against insurgents.
- Abu Yahia al-Libi , an Al Qaeda militant who escaped from jail in Afghanistan urged Sunni militants to unite and said the security plan had failed in a video tape posted on the internet.
- A Katyusha rocket exploded 50 yards from from the U.N. secretary-general, Ban Ki-moon during a news conference Thursday in Baghdad's Green Zone.
- A senior aide to Moqtada al-Sadr, Qais Khazaali and his brother Laith Khazaali, were arrested by the U.S. military in direct connection to the kidnapping and murder in January of five American soldiers in Kerbala.
- Nichirvan Barzani , prime minister of Iraqi Kurdistan raised fresh calls on Thursday for a referendum to decide the future of the country's crucial oil hub of Kirkuk.
- U.N. agencies that a chronic shortage of safe drinking water risks causing more child deaths and an outbreak of waterborne disease such as cholera during the summer.
- About 160,000 Iraqis from outside the mountainous Kurdish north have moved there to flee a growing civil war, according to Refugees International.
- The Ministry of Defense is under immense pressure from political sectarian factions who want to have a bigger say in its recruiting and operating policies.
- The headquarters of the Shiite Fadhila (Virtue) party in Basra was completely burnt down during clashes with armed men besieging the house of the Basra mayor and trying to storm it.
- Iraq has asked Turkey to open a new entry point on their international borders to cope with expanding trade exchange.
- Turkey are prepared for military intervention in northern Iraq against the PKK if the U.S. doesn’t intervene.
- Iranian agents are paying up to 500 dollars a month for young Basrawi men to attack the coalition.
