Gunmen killed a Sunni Muslim cleric who was entering a mosque in Baghdad to perform noon prayers yesterday -- the second attack on a cleric belonging to the influential Association of Muslim Scholars in as many days -- the group said.
The attack came as relatives pleaded for the release of a British and two American hostages as a deadline loomed for the trio's beheading.
PHOTO: AP
The cleric, Sheik Mohammed Jadoa al-Janabi, was killed in Baghdad's predominantly Shiite al-Baya neighborhood. He was unarmed and had no security guards, said one official who spoke on condition of anonymity.
Late Sunday, gunmen attacked the car of another cleric, Sheik Hazem al-Zeidi, after he left a mosque in Baghdad's mostly Shiite eastern slum of Sadr City, said Sheik Abdul-Sattar Abdul-Jabbar, a senior member of the group.
Al-Zeidi was killed and his two bodyguards were taken hostage, though they were released unharmed early yesterday, he said.
There have been tit-for-tat killings of Shiite and Sunni clerics across the country the past year. They are widely believed to be motivated by sectarian sentiments, but the embattled police never thoroughly investigate such cases.
The Association of Muslim Scholars is a conservative group that strongly opposes the US presence in Iraq but has worked for the release of foreign hostages.
Insurgents have used kidnappings and spectacular bombings as their weapons of choice in a 17-month campaign to undermine the interim government of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi and force the US and its allies out of Iraq.
The Tawhid and Jihad group, led by Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, was threatening to behead Americans Jack Hensley and Eugene Armstrong and Briton Kenneth Bigley yesterday. The three construction contractors were seized from their Baghdad house last week.
The British government and Bigley's brother, Philip, appealed for their release in statements broadcast repeatedly yesterday on pan-Arab satellite TV station Al-Arabiya.
"Ken has enjoyed working in the Arab world for the last 10 years in civil engineering and has many Arabic friends and is understanding and appreciative of the Islamic culture. He wanted to help the ordinary Iraqi people and is just doing his job," Philip Bigley said. "At the end of the day, we just want him home safe and well."
Hensley's wife, Patty, told Al-Jazeera that she learned of her husband's abduction through media reports. She said he, like all Americans in Iraq, was there to help the Iraqi people.
Tropical Storm Usagi strengthened to a typhoon yesterday morning and remains on track to brush past southeastern Taiwan from tomorrow to Sunday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was approximately 950km east-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost point, the CWA said. It is expected to enter the Bashi Channel and then turn north, moving into waters southeast of Taiwan, it said. The agency said it could issue a sea warning in the early hours of today and a land warning in the afternoon. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving at
UPDATED FORECAST: The warning covered areas of Pingtung County and Hengchun Peninsula, while a sea warning covering the southern Taiwan Strait was amended The Central Weather Administration (CWA) at 5:30pm yesterday issued a land warning for Typhoon Usagi as the storm approached Taiwan from the south after passing over the Philippines. As of 5pm, Usagi was 420km south-southeast of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan proper’s southernmost tip, with an average radius of 150km, the CWA said. The land warning covered areas of Pingtung County and the Hengchun Peninsula (恆春), and came with an amended sea warning, updating a warning issued yesterday morning to cover the southern part of the Taiwan Strait. No local governments had announced any class or office closures as of press time last night. The typhoon
DISCONTENT: The CCP finds positive content about the lives of the Chinese living in Taiwan threatening, as such video could upset people in China, an expert said Chinese spouses of Taiwanese who make videos about their lives in Taiwan have been facing online threats from people in China, a source said yesterday. Some young Chinese spouses of Taiwanese make videos about their lives in Taiwan, often speaking favorably about their living conditions in the nation compared with those in China, the source said. However, the videos have caught the attention of Chinese officials, causing the spouses to come under attack by Beijing’s cyberarmy, they said. “People have been messing with the YouTube channels of these Chinese spouses and have been harassing their family members back in China,”
The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said there are four weather systems in the western Pacific, with one likely to strengthen into a tropical storm and pose a threat to Taiwan. The nascent tropical storm would be named Usagi and would be the fourth storm in the western Pacific at the moment, along with Typhoon Yinxing and tropical storms Toraji and Manyi, the CWA said. It would be the first time that four tropical cyclones exist simultaneously in November, it added. Records from the meteorology agency showed that three tropical cyclones existed concurrently in January in 1968, 1991 and 1992.
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