DPA/Kirkuk, Iraq
A political party representing ethnic minority Turkmen in northern Iraq yesterday called for the creation of a Turkmen militia that would work alongside Iraqi security forces, following the murder of a leading member the night before.
The Iraqi Turkmen Front made the call in a statement mourning the death of its Mosul representative Yawiz Ahmed Hussein, who was gunned down in front of his house in the east of the city on Sunday.
“Throughout this past year, many of the victims of terrorism and violence in Iraq were Turkmen,” the group said.
In a separate attack on Sunday, Sheikh Fadil Jaroh, a leader of the Shabak ethnic minority, was killed in Majmoua, also in the eastern Mosul.
The city, located around 400km north of the capital Baghdad, and its surroundings are among the most ethnically diverse regions of Iraq. It is also among the most dangerous. Despite successive security pushes that police say have netted hundreds of suspected insurgents, gunmen continue to launch near-daily attacks in the area.
In Kirkuk, likewise home to a patchwork of ethnicities and religions, four armed men abducted a Christian man, police said yesterday.
The men pulled Boutros Matta Ishaq, who works for an oil company in the city, into their car in the southern Kirkuk district of Al Wasti, police said.
He is the second prominent Christian to be abducted in the city in recent weeks. In late October, police found the body of a Christian businessman in the Al Hai Al Askari neighbourhood, a few days after his abduction.
“The Christians have their roots here in Iraq, and particularly in this city, and no one can doubt their patriotism,” the local Chaldean Christian group said in a statement. Kirkuk’s Christians were the target of threats, kidnappings and murder, the group added.
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