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Militias abduct Sunnis in response to Isis attacks

Iraq’s Shi’ite militias have abducted and killed “scores” of Sunni civilians in retaliation for the onslaught by the Sunni militant Islamic State (Isis) group, Amnesty International said yesterday.

The rights group claimed that the attacks are supported by the Shi’ite-led government in Baghdad.

The militiamen number in the tens of thousands and wear military uniforms but operate outside any legal framework and without any official oversight, Amnesty said.

In its new new report Absolute Impunity: Militia Rule in Iraq, Amnesty said that the gunmen aren’t prosecuted for the crimes they commit.

The accusations were based on interviews with families and survivors who claimed that members of four prominent Iraqi Shi’ite militias — Asaib Ahl al-Haq, the Badr Brigades, the Mahdi Army, and Ketaeb Hizbollah — were behind many abductions and killings of Sunnis in the country.

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