The Kataib Sabri speaks of are what the U.S. military calls
"concerned local citizens". Most are former resistance fighters, now
being paid 300 dollars a month to stop attacking occupation forces and
to back them instead.
The groups, which the U.S. military claims
are 82 percent Sunni, are viewed as a threat by the government in
Baghdad led by U.S.-backed Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. The PM
has said these groups will never become part of the government security
forces. But while seen with suspicion at many places, these forces are
also being welcomed in some.
Residents of Baquba, 40 km
northeast of Baghdad, say the Kataib have brought a decrease in
violence, and now enjoy a respect that the Iraqi army and police never
have.
"The new prestige that Kataib enjoy has enraged the Iraqi
police and army," an officer in the directorate-general of police,
speaking on condition of anonymity, told IPS. "In one operation in a
village near Khalis city 15 km west of Baquba, the directorate-general
of police contributed just 20 men, while the Kataib fighters numbered
450. This shows how the Americans now rely more on the Kataib than on
us."
Adding to the growing rift between the U.S.-backed fighters
and government security forces is the increasing disgust with the
mostly Shia-backed government in Baghdad.
"The coalition forces
have to correct what they have done in bringing in such a sectarian
government," a Baquba resident said. "The existence of militants is the
result of the bad performance of the government and the ruling council
of Diyala in particular. Enemies are created by injustice and
unfairness.
"Everything has been affected by the lack of
security, and the only reason behind that is the occupation and its
feeble government," the resident said.
Residents remain leery of travelling outside of Baquba. Armed groups, often with unknown allegiance, control the roads.
Hded
district, 10 km south of Baquba, is situated on the road to Baghdad.
"The violence here has prevented people freely using the highway,"
43-year-old bus driver Muhsin Muhamed Kareem told IPS. Government
forces have failed to provide security, he said.
Muqdadiya area,
about 30 km north of Baquba, has become a danger spot on the road to
Sulaimaniya province in the Kurdish north. Many want to go there for
business because Kurdish areas have better security, but militiamen
from the Shia Mehdi Army often target Sunni travellers around Muqdadiya.
"The
military operations which started two months ago cleared out the
militants but did not control the militia because they are the police
and army," a Muqdadiya resident said.
"A policeman at an
official checkpoint in Muqdadiya asked a person, who was sitting beside
me in my van, what his sect was," a frequent traveller on the route
said. "Passengers know that the police behaviour is sectarian."
A
resident of Aswad village, eight kilometres west of Baquba, told IPS
that people have reason to support the U.S.-backed Sunni fighters
rather than the government forces.
"The Iraqi army is
hard-hearted with the people because they think that all the villagers
are terrorists. People feel safer with the other forces."
*Ahmed,
a correspondent in Iraq's Diyala province, works in close collaboration
with Dahr Jamail, our U.S.-based specialist writer on Iraq who has
reported extensively from Iraq and the Middle East
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