Sectarian Violence Flares as Shiites Raid Sunni Area

JOHN F. BURNS, NYTimes

Bands of armed Shiite militiamen stormed through a neighborhood in north-central Baghdad on Saturday, opening fire on Sunni Arab residents and driving hundreds from their homes, an Iraqi Army officer said, in one of the most flagrant episodes of sectarian violence yet unleashed in the capital. At nightfall, an Iraqi Army officer said that 150 families, many with small children, had boarded a convoy of trucks and cars outside a Sunni mosque in the Hurriya neighborhood, hoping to flee to Sunni areas of the capital where they would be safe. He estimated the number of people involved at between 500 and 1,000, and said that many of them were huddled in the open backs of trucks in the winter cold. The officer, Col. Abdullah, said the convoy had been waiting outside the mosque for several hours, fearing attacks by Shiite gunmen if they left. He declined to give an estimate of the number of people killed and wounded in the fighting, saying the situation was too chaotic after five hours of street-to-street fighting...

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