Iraqis seek answers from security firm

One clergyman urged that immunity for foreign
security contractors be lifted.

COMBINED DISPATCHES

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Iraqi officials demanded answers of an Australian-owned security company blamed in the killing of two Iraqi Christian women laid to rest Wednesday amid rising calls for a crackdown on private bodyguards used by the U.S. government.

The scrutiny of Unity Resources Group began a day after its guards allegedly gunned down the two women in their car, and less than a month after 17 Iraqis died in a hail of bullets fired by Blackwater USA contractors at a busy Baghdad intersection.

At a funeral in Baghdad’s Armenian Orthodox Virgin Mary church, the Rev. Kivork Arshlian urged the government to punish those responsible. The immunity enjoyed by foreign security contractors in Iraq should be lifted, he said.

“This is a crime against humanity in general and against Iraqis in particular. Many other people were killed in a similar way,” he said. “We call upon the government to put an end to these killings.”

His comments reflected growing anger here against the contractors — nearly all based in the United States, Britain and other Western countries.

As the largest security firm operating in Iraq, much of that rage has been directed at Blackwater, which protects U.S. diplomats as they move about on Baghdad’s dangerous streets. An Iraqi investigation into the Sept. 16 killings recommended that the U.S. State Department sever all contracts for the company’s operations in Iraq within six months.

A top aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki told The Associated Press that the American government was considering meeting the demand.

“They have seen that the Iraqi government is serious and inflexible on this issue. But so far there has been no concrete answer from the U.S. Embassy showing it was definitely going to drop Blackwater,” the aide said on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the issue.

The aide said the al-Maliki government told the embassy, “We will draft and pass laws that would lift the immunity on these security companies to stop their reckless behavior.”

The embassy declined to comment.

According to witnesses and police, the Armenian Christian women died when their white Oldsmobile was struck by bullets from two Unity guards as the convoy was returning to a company compound in the Karradah district.

“We cannot say the guards shot at random, but we rather say that they used deadly force in a situation where they shouldn’t have,” said government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh. “The preliminary investigation has shown that there was no threat to the convoy. The families of the victims will be summoned according to the legal procedures. They can file a law suit against the security company.”

Meanwhile, a recent jump in violence across Iraq continued Wednesday, with at least 16 people killed and 45 wounded in various attacks, including seven involving improvised bombs. More than 55 people were killed and more than 110 were wounded on Tuesday.

Maj. Gen. Kevin Bergner, the top U.S. military spokesman in Iraq, said the attacks were part of what’s become an annual increase in violence during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan, which ends this weekend. He said the attacks were mounted mainly by al-Qaida in Iraq, which he said is trying to reverse a growing movement among fellow Sunni Muslims who are turning against it.