Iraq sentences 11 to death for government bombings

[February 04, 2010]  BAGHDAD (AP) -- A Baghdad court on Thursday sentenced 11 Iraqis to death for their roles in the first of a series of audacious attacks last year to target government buildings in the heart of the city.

The August bombings of Iraq's foreign and finance ministries were a major blow to Iraq's Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who is seeking to reassure Iraqis his government has security under control ahead of crucial March elections.

Iraqi Supreme Judicial Council spokesman Abdul-Sattar Bayrkdar said a criminal court in Baghdad's eastern Risafa district found the 11 defendants guilty of financing, planning and participating in the Aug. 19 bombings that devastated the foreign and finance ministries.

The blasts killed more than 100 people.

There have since been two other massive attacks in Baghdad primarily targeting government buildings, in October and December. Those attacks together killed more than 280 people and injured hundreds more.

The attacks have sparked outrage among many Iraqis, shaking their confidence in the nation's tenuous security gains because they occurred in what are supposed to be some of the safest parts of the city.

Bayrkdar said the defendants have a month to appeal the death sentences, which were handed down with Thursday's ruling. He declined to provide details about those convicted.

Shortly after the August attacks, the Iraqi military released what it said was the confession of a Sunni man identified as a senior member of Saddam Hussein's ousted Baath Party. The military said the man admitted to supervising the attack against the finance ministry.

In the televised confession, the 57-year-old suspect identified himself as Wisam Ali Khazim Ibrahim and said he was a Baath Party member and former police officer before the 2003 U.S.-led invasion.

Ibrahim said the operation was ordered by a Baath Party operative in Syria in a bid "to destabilize the regime." Iraqi authorities said at the time more than 10 people comprising the whole network involved in the attacks had been arrested.

Separately, police said they arrested a man Wednesday night who was wanted for his alleged involvement with al-Qaida in Iraq.

Karbala police spokesman Capt. Alaa Abbas Jaafar said the suspect, Khalid al-Khonfisi, was captured in a police raid of his hideout near Jurf al-Sakhar, about 43 miles south of Baghdad.

Al-Khonfisi was wanted on charges including murder, kidnapping and terrorist acts, Jaafar said.

[Associated Press; By SAMEER N. YACOUB]

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