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Iraq hunts killers of Egypt envoy

Posted on: Friday, 8 July 2005, 05:48 CDT

By Alastair Macdonald

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq urged fellow Arab and Muslim states on Friday to send ambassadors to Baghdad in defiance of attacks by al Qaeda insurgents, who killed Egypt's kidnapped envoy and have threatened other diplomats.

"The criminals wanted by this act to terrorise Arab and Islamic countries and deter them from upgrading their diplomatic missions in Iraq," Iraq's Foreign Ministry said.

"Arab and Islamic countries are asked to prove their seriousness in combating terrorism and send their ambassadors to Baghdad so they send the right message to the terrorists."

Iraq's president promised top security for diplomats and Interior Minister Bayan Jabor, who has chided envoys for traveling without protection, said Iraqi armed escorts were always available.

Police were hunting the killers of Egyptian envoy Ihab el- Sherif, a day after Cairo confirmed his death at the hands of al Qaeda kidnappers. He had been snatched off a Baghdad street on Saturday.

"Our investigations are continuing," a senior Interior Ministry official said. The Islamist militants posted a video showing Sherif speaking but not his killing.

The Iraqi government has decribed the abduction and killing of Sherif, as well as at least two other attacks on senior diplomats in the capital this week, as part of attempts by insurgents to isolate the new, U.S.-backed government.

Pakistan's ambassador left the country after his motorcade was shot up on Tuesday. The same day, the envoy from the Gulf Arab state of Bahrain was shot in the hand as he drove to work.

Iraq had said last week that Egypt was planning to become the first Arab state to have a full-ranking ambassador in Baghdad since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003 -- something Cairo never confirmed. Opposition figures in Egypt said plans to upgrade Sherif's job had led to his death.

SECURITY OFFERED

Iraqi President Jalal Talabani dismissed suggestions that the attacks on the diplomats in Baghdad would further discourage the dispatch of emissaries from Arab capitals:

"It will have no effect," he said late on Thursday during a visit to the Shi'ite religious establishment in Najaf.

"Two countries, Syria and Jordan, have asked to reopen their embassies in Iraq. For our part, we will take strict security precautions to protect embassies and diplomatic residences."

Though publicly critical of Iraq's Sunni Arab insurgency, most Arab leaders are Sunnis and view with some mistrust the U.S.-sponsored new government in Baghdad, run by Shi'ites from Iraq's long oppressed majority community and by non-Arab Kurds.

Iraq's defense minister signed a military cooperation agreement with Tehran on Thursday, a move that is unlikely to have helped dispel widespread Arab disquiet about the government's sectarian ties to Shi'ite, non-Arab Iran.

Washington, at daggers drawn with Tehran, has not commented.

A U.S. military official linked the campaign against embassy staff to a crackdown by security forces on car bombings that may have caused insurgents to adopt new tactics for a time.

"If we come down hard on one kind of attack they shift to something else," he said. "A number of diplomats have been attacked. Our impression is that will continue and we've got to turn our attention to improving security."

Already a number of attacks on highly sensitive targets like Baghdad's fortified Green Zone government and diplomatic compound and the city's airport had been thwarted, he added:

"The enemy is looking for ways to keep this war going and tear down the belief that the government can succeed."

ACCUSATIONS

Iraq's al Qaeda group, led by Jordanian Abu Musab al- Zarqawi, announced Sherif's death in a Web statement: "We al Qaeda in Iraq announce that the judgment of God has been implemented against the ambassador of the infidels ... Oh enemy of God, Ihab el-Sherif, this is your punishment in this life."

The Egyptian presidency said Sherif "lost his life at the hands of terrorism which trades in Islam."

An Egyptian diplomatic source said Egypt had confirmation of the killing "through multiple contacts" but had not received decisive evidence and did not know where Sherif's body might be.

Egypt is one of the friendliest states in the region toward the United States and was the first to make peace with Israel, where Sherif had previously been Cairo's top envoy.

Iraq's interior minister made veiled accusations that Sherif had been in contact with Iraqi insurgents, which had cost him his life. Sherif's ministry said his job was to meet people from all sections of Iraqi society.

Sectarian tensions are evident across in Iraq and especially in the capital, where daily killings are attributed to ethnic and religious strife. Late on Thursday, the imam of a Shi'ite mosque was shot dead in his car in the south of the city.

(Additional reporting by Omar Anwar in Baghdad and Khaled Farhan in Najaf)

Source: REUTERS

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