Tuesday, June 19, 2007
Al-Maliki fires Basrah police chief
Security, Politics
(RFE/RL) - According to informed sources, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki fired Al-Basrah police chief Major General Ali Hammadi al-Musawi on June 18 over the failure of his forces to end attacks on Sunni mosques in the city, international media reported the same day. An official in the office of Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh, speaking on the condition of anonymity, confirmed the firing, but declined to elaborate, saying only that replacing al-Musawi is part of the restructuring of the Iraqi police force.
However, an unnamed police source said al-Musawi was "seen as incompetent, because he couldn't stop attacks by Shi'ite extremists against two Sunni mosques [in Al-Basrah] in the wake of the Samarra attacks." On June 15, gunmen wearing Interior Ministry commando uniforms blew up the Talhah bin Ubaydallah shrine and on June 16, a car bomb destroyed the Al-Ashrah Al-Mubashra Mosque. The wave of attacks against Sunni mosques is widely believed to be in response to the June 13 attack on the Al-Askari Mosque in Samarra, a revered Shi'ite shrine.
Labels: Al-Ashrah Al-Mubashra Mosque, Al-Askari Mosque, Basra, Major General Ali Hammadi al-Musawi, Nouri Al-Maliki, Talhah bin Ubaydallah shrine
