Reply #10: South and north, Iraqi Kurds squeezed

[maddezmom]

South and north, Iraqi Kurds squeezed By CHARLES J. HANLEY, AP Special Correspondent
9 minutes ago



BAGHDAD - From south and north, Iraq's Kurdish region felt pressure from two sides Saturday, as saboteurs bombed a vital bridge link to Baghdad, and Turkish troops across the border massed for a possible strike.

"We won't allow it to be turned into a battleground," Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Saturday of the relatively peaceful Iraqi north, a haven for anti-Turkish Kurdish guerrillas.

Sectarian violence between Sunni and Shiite Muslims raged on in Iraq's center, meanwhile, as hours of mortar barrages killed eight people in a Sunni neighborhood of Baghdad that is surrounded by Shiites, and a prominent Sunni cleric was gunned down on the street.

The U.S. casualty toll mounted for May, third-deadliest month for Americans in the four-year-old war: A soldier wounded in a roadside bomb blast in Baghdad last Wednesday was reported to have died of his wounds, raising the month's death toll to at least 127.

Tensions have heightened in recent weeks in northern Iraq as Turkey has built up its military forces on Iraq's border, a move clearly meant to pressure Iraq to rein in the rebels of the Kurdistan Workers' Party, or PKK, separatists who launch raids into southeast Turkey's Kurdish region from hideouts in Iraq.

more:http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070602/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq_070602184110