Death Squads and Fear Rule Iraq

Nov. 30, 2006 — -- Regardless of statements made by the leaders of Iraq and the United States during their meeting in Jordan, Iraq remains a country crippled by unabated violence.

Iraq remains on the brink of all-out civil war. Its people are terrorized by car bombs set by Sunni insurgents, and by the Shiite death squads attached to the political parties in the so-called National Unity Government.

You need only to talk to ordinary Iraqis on the street and they will tell you about their fear of being blown up by a car bomb, or of being a target of sectarian militiamen who kidnap and kill with impunity

"They are out of control," said Mohammad Adnan, a money changer. "The proof is in the number of killings you see every day."

Iraq Prime Minister Nouri Kamel al-Maliki made a number of assertions after his short summit meeting with President Bush that sounded more like wishful thinking than an objective statement of fact.

Maliki told ABC News' Charles Gibson, the anchor of "World News Tonight," that his government "is disarming all the militias."

He also told a news conference in Baghdad that Iraq's armed forces were hunting terrorists and killing a large number of them.

"We have a short-term strategy, which will enable us to receive gradual control of the security situation so a disaster is avoided," he said.

He also suggested that Iraqis were one big family.

"We are all brothers," Maliki said. "There is no difference between Shiites and Sunni Arabs, Kurds or Christians."

Sadly there is no evidence that militias are being disarmed.

On the contrary, the largest, most powerful among them, the Shiite Mahdi Army, now has at least 40,000 men, possibly even as many as 60,000, according to some estimates.

These numbers make it the largest single military force in Iraq, second only to the U.S. Army.

It's about four times the total number of combat-ready brigades in the Iraqi army.

According to a recent U.N. report, the number of Iraqi civilians who die violent deaths has now gone up to a daily average of 120.

One hundred and twenty innocent, usually unarmed people are snatched from their cars, their homes, and the streets of Iraq.

Their bodies are then discovered littered throughout Iraq, often bearing signs of torture and execution-style killing.

"Security is zero now," said Esam Waheed, a translator. "All kinds of militias are prowling the streets and killing blameless people."