More than 100 prisoners set free in Baghdad
(Reuters)
Updated: 2006-06-07 14:54
More than 100 detainees were released in Baghdad on Wednesday, a Reuters
witness said, a day after new Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said a total of
2,500 would be freed to help foster "national reconciliation."
An Iraqi hospital
worker stands near the bodies after a car bomb blast near a funeral
reception Tuesday night, which killed five people and wounded 12 others,
in Baghdad, June 7, 2006. [Reuters] |
About 110 detainees had been gathered at the capital's main bus station,
where prisoners are taken before they are set free, a Reuters reporter at the
scene said. They were later released.
Maliki, who has pledged to heal sectarian wounds and crush a Sunni Arab
insurgency, said in a televised statement on Tuesday that the prisoner release
would free those who had no clear evidence against them or had been mistakenly
detained.
Initially, 500 people would be released on Wednesday, he said, but did not
give details. Many of those in prison are from ousted President Saddam Hussein's
once dominant Sunni community.
It was not immediately clear whether prisoners were also freed in other parts
of the country on Wednesday.
A critical U.N. human rights report last month said that there were 28,700
detainees in Iraq, including 5,000 held by the Interior Ministry even though it
should only detain people for short periods of time.
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