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Iraq withdraws rogue battalion
05/05/2005 21:24 - (SA)
Samarra - A battalion of elite Iraqi commandos was pulled out of the rebel bastion of Samarra last month after repeated incidents of misconduct, several US officers told AFP on Thursday.
In an incident the second week of March that sealed the unit's fate, the commandos searched a home near Samarra, found no incriminating evidence and instead set it on fire, officers said.
The battalion, considered the vanguard of Iraq's security forces was widely perceived as running amok under the leadership of a colonel named Jalil, said the officers, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
The commandos are a controversial 12 000-strong unit, many of them from Saddam Hussein's former special forces, security directorate and republican guard.
The rogue battalion has since been replaced by what the US military describes as a far more disciplined batch of troops.
It had been conducting joint operations with US troops to root out the insurgency in Samarra, a Sunni Arab city which remains one of Iraq's worst rebel bastions.
- AFP
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