Iraqi police brigade demobilized for complicity with death squads

Iraq has demobilized an entire police brigade in Baghdad for complicity with sectarian death squads, top U.S. military spokesman said on Wednesday.

"It was realized that removing them from Baghdad would enhance security," General William Caldwell told a news conference, referring to the 8th Brigade of the Iraqi National Police.

"There was some possible complicity in allowing death squad elements to move freely when they should have been impeding them," Caldwell said.

The U.S. military discovered the problem of the police brigade during its broad brigade-by-brigade assessment of police in Baghdad, the U.S. spokesman said.

Caldwell disclosed that some 800 to 1,200 officers would be removed from posts in northwestern Baghdad and sent to a U.S. military forward operating base for "anti-militia and anti- sectarian" training.

The Iraqi government made the decision late Tuesday, Caldwell noted.

On Tuesday night, an Interior Ministry source said that the major general who commanded the battalion that includes the brigade had been suspended temporarily and ordered transferred.

Meanwhile, a lieutenant colonel had also been detained for investigation, according to the source.

Baghdad has been the scene for fierce sectarian strife between Sunni insurgents and death squads which are widely believed to have links with Shiite militia.

Source: Xinhua