Attackers gunned down an elderly Christian couple late Sunday inside their Baghdad home, the latest in a string of religious-rooted violence that has spurred international outcry and a full-court press for justice from Iraqi authorities.
Gunmen broke into the couple's residence in Baladiyat, a predominantly Shiite area in eastern Baghdad, during the night and shot them dead, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said.
Hours earlier, Maj. Gen. Qassim Atta said in a press conference broadcast on state-run Iraqiya TV that 15 "Arabs" -- in Iraq, a euphemism indicating they came from outside the country -- were responsible for three deadly attacks in Baghdad in recent months, including a bloody church siege.
The spokesman for the Iraqi military command in Baghdad showed pictures of each of the men, whom he called "terrorists" and said they had entered Iraq from unidentified countries between June and August.
Ten of them had died while carrying out suicide attacks or had been killed by Iraqi security forces, Atta said. The other five remain at large, with Atta urging the public to help in tracking them down.
"According to our intelligence information, four of the five terrorists are still in Iraq and one of them has fled to Syria," he said.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/meast/12/05/iraq.christian.attacks/index.html?hpt=T2
