IRAQ: Police recruiting drive south of Baghdad draws more than 900 despite repeated attacks

Some 900 young Sunni Iraqis sign up to join the police force in an area south of Baghdad, braving the ever present threat of being targeted by insurgents. Under tightened security, more than nine-hundred Sunni recruits on Tuesday (July 10) signed up to the Iraqi police force in the town of al-Rasheed, just south of Baghdad. The recruits, who all hail from al-Rasheed, once a stronghold of al-Qaeda militants in Iraq, said they decided to join the police force in order to serve their country and improve security. "Of course, we have come first of all for the sake of serving our homeland and secondly, to eradicate terrorism. There is no difference between Sunni and Shi'ite, we are all brothers who like each other. We are all here to serve this dear country," said one unidentified recruit. The new recruits gathered on the outskirts of the town and were frisked and searched by army personnel before they could enter the recruitment centre. Once recruited, the men are driven to the nearby city of Mahmudiya to attend a two-month-long training course. The head of al-Rasheed Municipal Council, Ammash Kadhim, expressed gratitude to the men for signing up to the police force. "God bless those who truly want to protect their country and get rid of sectarianism. We promise the Prime Minister al-Maliki that we will support each other and work on serving this country. All of us will work on serving Iraq's unity," he said. Fresh recruits have been prime targets for insurgents, with the latest attack occurring in the western city of Falluja when a suicide bomber killed 23 recruits hours after they joined the army on Sunday (July 8). Police and army officials said the bomber had driven his car into a truck carrying the young Sunni Arab men. Sunni Arab tribal leaders in Anbar have rounded up thousands of men to join local security forces to fight Sunni Islamist al Qaeda, in anger at the militant group's indiscriminate killings of civilians and harsh interpretation of Islam.

ITN Source | July 11, 2007

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