From the Los Angeles Times

Iraq says the worst is over in Baghdad

Statistics show that 'the forces of darkness' have been defeated, the government says. The U.S. wants Iraqi leaders to focus on political progress.

By Tina Susman
Los Angeles Times Staff Writer

9:24 AM PST, November 19, 2007

BAGHDAD — Iraq's government today said security statistics showed that Baghdad had "defeated the forces of darkness" after more than a year of sectarian warfare, and the United States said it was crucial that Iraqi leaders use the relative calm to get their political fighting under control.

The government released numbers indicating a major decline in violent attacks in Baghdad and the surrounding areas. Attacks such as bombings numbered 323 last month, compared with 850 in February, when a U.S.-led security crackdown was launched, according to the government figures.

On Sunday, the U.S. military announced a sharp drop in violence in Baghdad and the rest of the country since the start of the crackdown, which brought an extra 28,500 American forces into the country. Most of those troops have been deployed in the capital, where U.S. and Iraqi forces have set up hundreds of checkpoints to monitor vehicles for weapons and bombs.

"Certainly we still have more to do, but no one can deny that we have passed the difficult stage in Baghdad, the stage that we all had fears of sliding to a civil war," Ali Dabbagh, a government spokesman, told Arabia TV.

A U.S. Embassy spokesman said the government must use the slowdown in bombings, mass abductions and major street fighting to focus on legislation aimed at national reconciliation, and getting basic services such as water and electricity to all Iraqis.

"This is absolutely the case," said the spokesman, Phillip Reeker. "This is an important moment in the history of the new Iraq and in Baghdad as well."

The relative quiet, which continues to be shattered by occasional car bombs and roadside blasts, did not come soon enough for four members of the Iraqi national soccer team who defected during a trip to Australia and requested asylum.

The four -- three players and a coach -- had played Australia's soccer team Saturday in a qualifying match for the 2008 Beijing Olympics. They vanished Sunday after Australia defeated Iraq, 2-0. An official in Iraq's sports journalists association, Saif Muhsin, said the Iraqi Olympic Committee got word today that the four were asking for asylum in Australia.

Also today, an Iraqi television journalist abducted Friday was freed. The kidnappers called his family members and told them to pick him up in a Baghdad neighborhood before dawn, said the manager of the independent Baghdadiya TV station.

"They went and found him standing on the street alone," said the manager, who asked not to be identified. He said the reporter, Muntathar Zaidi, had minor bruises but was otherwise unharmed.