Iraqi Defence Minister Saadun al-Dulaimi speaks at the defence ministry in Baghdad during a memorial meeting yesterday for five soldiers killed late last month near the site of a long-running anti-government protest in Ramadi.

 

AFP/Baghdad

Acting Defence Minister Saadun al-Dulaimi yesterday accused Turkey of controlling Sunni anti-government protests in Shia-majority Iraq, saying the demonstrations are a haven for “terrorists and killers”.

“There are foreign agendas controlling these sites,” Dulaimi said of the protests.

“It is like Anbar, or Mosul or Samarra are part of the Ottoman Empire,” he said, referring to Sunni areas in Iraq.

Areas of what is now Iraq were part of the Ottoman Empire, which was governed from Istanbul in what is now Turkey, before the empire’s dissolution after World War I.

Ties between Baghdad and Ankara have been strained by issues including Turkey hosting Tareq al-Hashemi, Iraq’s former vice president who has been sentenced to death on charges including murder.

Dulaimi also had harsh words for the protesters themselves.

“Shame... on those sites that are opening their doors to Istanbul or any other country,” he said.

“Protest sites have become a safe haven for terrorists and killers and those who call for strife, sectarianism and hate.”

The protests broke out in Sunni areas more than four months ago.

Demonstrators have called for the resignation of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, a Shia, and criticised authorities for allegedly targeting their community with wrongful detentions and accusations of involvement in terrorism.

On April 23, security forces moved on protesters near the town of Hawijah in Kirkuk province, sparking clashes that killed 53 people.

* Mortar fire and a bomb killed at least four people in Baghdad yesterday, while another bomb killed an oil company employee in north Iraq, security and medical officials said.

Four mortar rounds hit the Shurta al-Rabea area in south Baghdad, killing at least two people and wounding 10, and a bomb explosion in a cafe in the Jamiyah area in the west of the city killed two people and wounded 12, officials said.

A roadside bomb killed an engineer from the North Oil Company and wounded two other people in the northern city of Kirkuk, officials said.