6 U.S. Soldiers killed today. But McCain says the surge is working. Somebody take a two by four and knock the sense back into McCain. He lost it along the way somewhere.

SUICIDE bombers and militiamen fought back ferociously in the seventh week of the Baghdad security crackdown, killing at least 508 people in the past six days.

But the Government vowed it would win the race against terrorism and despair.

.As the deadly week drew to an end, radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr blamed the US for the violence and called for a huge anti-American demonstration on April 9, the fourth anniversary of the fall of Baghdad.

Marketplaces in Baghdad, Tal Afar and Khalis stood in ruins. Clean-up crews shovelled broken glass and debris into wheelbarrows in bloodstained streets. Bomb victims in coffins were hoisted atop cars and vans for the trip south for burial in Najaf.

In a sign of how deeply officials were shaken by the carnage, a top aide to Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, Sami al-Askari, pledged that the Government would not relent in efforts to curb violence.

“There is a race between the Government and the terrorists who are trying to make people reach the level of despair,” Mr al-Askari said. “But the Government is doing its best to defeat terrorists and it definitely will not be affected by these bombings.”

Read more at the Herald Sun

Email this Post  | RSS 2.0  |  Trackback  |  Filed under: Iraq