The Hindu : Iraqi forces fail to counter challenge

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Sunday, Feb 15, 2004

International

International

Iraqi forces fail to counter challenge

By Atul Aneja

MANAMA, FEB. 14. Iraqi resistance fighters stormed a security compound in the central Iraqi city of Fallujah on Saturday, killing 18 policemen and freeing around 100 prisoners.

In the first guerrilla attack of its kind, up to 50 men shouting Islamic slogans, lobbed grenades and moved freely from room to room inside the building.

Twenty-two people, including three attackers, were killed while around 30 people, mostly policemen, were injured.

The guerillas attacked from four directions using machine guns and mortars, eyewitnesses said.

The building that was targeted was the same that the head of the U.S. Central Command, John Abizaid, inspected on Thursday.

Gen. Abizaid had escaped unhurt when the convoy in which he was travelling in Fallujah came under an attack by guerillas using rocket-propelled grenades and other small arms.

It was not clear whether the prisoners who were freed were detained Iraqi guerillas or others. Iraqi fighters, who struck today, also attacked the office of the local Mayor — a young man who has been handpicked by the occupation authorities. U.S. troops later moved in to secure the area.

Large portions of Fallujah are fairly congested, but the town, on the banks of the Euphrates, is also known for its agriculture along its outskirts.

Saturday's strike has put a question mark on the preparedness of the U.S.-trained Iraqi security forces to counter the challenge posed by the resistance.

Gen. Abizaid, in an interview with the Associated Press, acknowledged that the Iraqi civil defence units were as yet "not ready".

Analysts point out that the U.S. forces, intending to gradually hand over power to handpicked Iraqis, will find it hard to move out of the country in an orderly manner unless Iraqis themselves can take over security duties and run other necessary institutions effectively.

Observers point out that the latest attack, which caps a week of escalating guerrilla strikes, is directed at wrecking U.S. plans to hand over power to an unelected Iraqi transitional Government by June 30.

Already, influential voices are challenging the U.S.-scripted handover blueprint.

On Friday, the spokesperson for the United Nations' special envoy to Iraq, Lakhdar Brahimi, who ended a week-long mission to Iraq, said major changes would be required in the U.S. plans to set up a new Iraqi government.

He, however, said that direct elections before June 30 were unlikely.

The U.S. plan has also come in for criticism from Ahmad Chalabi, a leading figure in the U.S.-appointed Governing Council.

In an interview to Al Jazeera satellite television channel, Mr. Chalabi, a Shia representative, said, "We think elections are possible before June 30. We insist on the power transfer (by the end of June) and that sovereignty should be handed over to an elected body that represents the opinions of the people of Iraq".

Mr. Chalabi's comments echo the views of Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, the top Shia spiritual leader, that Iraq's transition should be steered by its elected representatives and that it is they who should supervise the drafting of an interim constitution.

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