Troops begin crackdown in volatile Diyala province

Baghdad: Over the past few months a covert plan has been developed and implemented by the US army and Iraqi government to gradually bring Al Qaida members in Mesopotamia to Diylala province

"Part of this plan is to facilitate the movement of Al Qaida gunmen from Baghdad and Nineveh province to Diyala, in preparation for the strike which will be announced after achieving final victory on Al Qaida in Iraq," sources close to Iraqi army chief of staff Babekyr Zibari, told Gulf News.

About 30,000 joint Iraqi and US forces are taking part in a military operation against Al Qaida in Diyala dubbed operation Basha'er Al Khair.

That number is expected to increase to 50,000 if intelligence information is confirmed in Baghdad that Al Qaida has already moved a major sector of its gunmen within Diyala governorate.

The rural province has been exposed to a wave of sectarian violence in recent years and has been one of the hardest to control despite numerous military operations.

Suicide bombers

Hatem Al Zubaidi, an officer in the Iraqi Interior Ministry told Gulf News: "The strategic objective of Basha'er Al Khair is to prevent Al Qaida from recruiting more male and female suicide bombers, and sending them to Baghdad and other Iraqi cities."

The head of the provincial council in Diyala says operations are currently focused on the regional capital of Diyala but will be extended to areas near the Iranian border. Ebrahim Bajilan says he believes the new crackdown will take about two weeks "and then law will be imposed in all Diyala."

After the recent bombings in Karrada in central Baghdad that targeted Shiite pilgrims Iraqi government officials in the Green Zone have been increasingly convinced that security in the Iraqi capital, or anywhere in Iraq will be fragile as long as Al Qaida moves freely within Diyala province, and this conviction has prompted Iraqi military leaders to speed up the launch of military operation in this city.

However, Muthanna Al Azi, an officer in the former Iraqi army told Gulf News: "Al Qaida is not so naive to be lured into Diyala and I think that the key part of this organisation who are expert in guerrilla warfare have vanished from sight and moved to the northern Al Anbar province, some areas of Baghdad, Samarra and the Hamrin Mountains and it is likely that Al Qaida resorts to new tactics in the confrontation of the US Army and Iraqi forces in the coming stages."

Some sources in Baghdad believe the operation will continue for three weeks or maybe a month.

Final victory

A team of military and Iraqi politicians still believe that it will lead to final victory on Al Qaida, and another group anticipates that Al Qaida will escalate its bloody operations in other Iraqi cities to ease the military pressure on Diyala province and confuse the Iraqi government's plans to eliminate the organisation.

- With inputs from AP