'Clear off or we will kill you': Iraqi families take flight

[leftchick]

http://news.monstersandcritics.com/middleeast/article_1161409.php/Clear_off_or_we_will_kill_you_Iraqi_families_take_flight

Baghdad/Cairo - There are four cartridges lying in front of the front door, along with a note that reads: 'Clear off, or we will kill you.' Within two days the house is empty and the family has moved in with relatives in another part of the city.

This and other mafia-style methods are being used by armed gangs in Iraq to drive targeted families from their homes.

The methods are used against Sunni Arab families living in predominantly Shiite areas, and Shiites living in areas where Sunnis are in the majority, such as parts of west Baghdad.

One of those driven out was 58-year-old farmer Mahdi Sadek, who has abandoned his fields in the western Baghdad suburb of Abu Ghraib. He now lives with his family in a tent in a refugee camp in the al-Shula quarter of Baghdad, where Shiites form a majority.

'I spent more than 35 years of my life there (Abu Ghraib). Now I'm here for reasons of safety,' Sadek says.

[Tempest]

1. More of that "Good progress"

n/t

[neuvocat]

2. Its only that bad stuff we hear.

:sarcasm: