Iraqi Baath militants vow attacks on US personnel

An Iraqi Sunni Muslim insurgent group with links to the banned Baath party of late dictator Saddam Hussein vowed on Monday to continue attacks on US personnel staying in Iraq even after a complete US troop withdrawal by the end of December.

In a video posted on the website of al-Nakshabandia, an Islamist armed group affiliated with the Baath party, a veiled man dressed in a military uniform called for jihad, or holy war, against US citizens who will be staying in Iraq after the withdrawal as trainers or security personnel.

"It was confirmed to us through the intelligence of our army that the enemy forces still exist in the bases they said they have withdrawn from and in their embassy... under the name of security companies or trainers or forces to protect Iraq's airspace and regional waters," said the man, who was identified as the military spokesman of the militant group.

"This existence of the American enemy... is nothing but a new form of occupation... we will continue our jihad and will target them wherever they were on Iraq's land and under any name, and we will strike with an iron fist," he said as he stood in front of Saddam's old Iraqi flag.

US officials have often said that al-Nakshabandia, whose full name is Jaish al-Tareqah al-Nakshabandia, are militants of the new Baath party and do not rule out possible cooperation between the insurgent group and al Qaeda in Iraq. Violence in Iraq has dropped sharply since the height of sectarian slaughter in 2006-07, but Sunni Islamists tied to al-Qaeda and members of Saddam's banned Baath party as well as rival Shi'ite militias, still carry out devastating attacks.

The remaining 10,000 US troops are due to leave before December 31, nearly nine years after the US-led invasion that ousted Saddam, a Sunni, and allowed the country's Shi'ite majority to rise to political supremacy.

Many Iraqis worry that without the buffer of a US presence, sectarian tensions will reignite. Iraqi authorities said on Friday a rare attack inside Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone was carried out by a suicide car bomber and may have been aimed at the country's prime minister.

Such attacks, as the US hands over security, may fuel tensions among the country's fragile power-sharing coalition of Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish political blocs.

On Monday, three bombs tore through crowds of Shi'ite pilgrims celebrating a major ritual in Iraq's Hilla city on Monday, killing least 22 - mostly women and children - and wounding 60 more.