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WORLD NEWSWednesday 13 January 2016
Sieges, starvation left Syrian
town in ‘grim’ state, UN says
People gather at the scene of a car bomb explosion in commercial area of New Baghdad, Iraq, BEIRUT (AP) — Siege and A day earlier, the U.N. said
Tuesday, Jan. 12, 2016. Gunmen stormed into a Baghdad mall on Monday after setting off a car starvation have left the that about 400 people
bomb and launching a suicide attack at its entrance in the city’s mainly Shiite east, Iraqi officials rebel-held Syrian town of in the town’s hospital
said. Madaya in a nightmarish needed to be evacuated
state not seen elsewhere immediately for medical
(AP Photo/Khalid Mohammed) in the country, a U.N. treatment as starvation
official who traveled and other factors had
Iraq: there said Tuesday, as left them on the brink of
some 300 residents fled death. Syrian authorities,
Attacks shatter relative calm after IS losses and desperately needed rebels and aid groups
humanitarian aid arrived. have yet to respond. The
S. GEORGE ordinated assault on the arate car bomb elsewhere The former mountain U.N. goal was to obtain
S. SALAHEDDIN western town of Haditha resort, besieged since last safe passage to evacuate
Associated Press which was repulsed by Iraqi in the city killed five people summer by forces loyal to the 400 later on Tuesday.
BAGHDAD (AP) — Deadly forces. President Bashar Assad, U.N. officials said it was
attacks in Baghdad and On Monday, the Sunni ex- and wounded 12. came to international too early to determine
a nearby town have shat- tremist group went after attention in recent weeks whether anyone had
tered the relative calm far softer targets in Baghdad Later that night, back-to- as reports of starvation died of hunger. But the
from the front lines of the and the town of Muqdadi- emerged and activists aid group Doctors Without
war against the Islamic yah to the northeast, with back suicide attacks on a shared images of Borders has said that 23
State group, raising con- attacks that appeared to emaciated children and people died of starvation
cerns Tuesday that the ex- be aimed at killing Shiite cafe frequented by gov- old men widely on social at a health center it
tremists may focus once civilians and aggravating media. supports in Madaya since
again on attacking civilians sectarian tensions -- a strat- ernment-allied Shiite militia- Sajjad Malik, the U.N. Dec. 1, including six infants
after a string of battlefield egy pursued with horrifying refugee agency’s chief in and five adults over 60.
losses. results by the group’s pre- men killed at least 24 peo- Damascus, told journalists Various U.N. officials have
In recent months, Iraqi decessor, al-Qaida in Iraq. that the “very grim” described how locals had
and Kurdish forces backed Gunmen targeted the en- ple and wounded 52 in the picture was the result been forced to forage for
by U.S.-led airstrikes have trance to the Jawhara mall of a blockade of food, food, such as risking walks
forced IS out of Sinjar in the in a mainly Shiite neigh- Shiite-dominated mixed medicine and other in minefields to collect
north and the provincial borhood of Baghdad late supplies that left the town grass or cooking up “leaf
capital of Ramadi west of Monday with a car bomb town of Muqdadiyah, in a “desperate situation.” soup,” and were burning
Baghdad. and a suicide bomber be- “There is no comparison cardboard to stay warm
But the extremist group has fore storming in and open- about 60 miles (90 kilome- to what we saw in in their homes.
proved resilient after previ- ing fire. They killed 18 peo- Madaya,” he said from Madaya is not the only
ous defeats, often seizing ple and wounded more ters) northeast of Baghdad. Damascus by telephone place in Syria suffering
territory on other frontiers of than 50 before Iraqi forces to Geneva. “It is a place from siege, an age-
its amoeba-like caliphate. landed on the roof and The Islamic State group on where you could see old tactic of war that
In the days after IS fighters battled their way inside, kill- there are people, but belligerents continue to
were driven out of Ramadi, ing two attackers and ar- Tuesday claimed both ma- there is no life... What we use despite international
the group launched a co- resting another four. A sep- saw is something that was laws banning it. The
jor attacks. pretty horrible.” U.N. says some 15
Malik described seeing municipalities across Syria
Angry Shiite mobs respond- shivering, malnourished are currently blockaded,
children and young with no one able to get in
ed to the Muqdadiyah adults, saying “most of or out.
them had not had bread Two Shiite villages in
bombings by attacking or rice or vegetables or the north, under siege
fruit for months.” He said by rebels, face similar
several Sunni mosques, a kilogram (2.2 pounds) circumstances, with food
of rice would sell there and medicine scarce.
completely destroying for $300, and noted one Residents are said to be
account of one person eating grass to survive
two of them and killing an selling a motorcycle to and undergoing surgery
buy 5 kilos of rice. without anesthesia.q
imam, said Sheikh Abdul-
Latif al-Himaim, Iraq’s head
of Sunni Religious Endow-
ments. “Organized gangs
were behind the attack (on
the mosques), seeking to
inflame sectarian tensions,”
he said. q
