Al Qaeda group threatens attacks across Iraq

An Al Qaeda affiliate group in Iraq has claimed responsibility for Monday’s wave of attacks that killed 115 people across the country and wounded hundreds others. In a statement posted on Wednesday on a militant website, the Islamic State of Iraq said the “blessed foray” marked the beginning of a campaign it calls “Breaking the Walls,” announced last week by the local insurgency’s leader Abu Bakr Al Baghdadi. Baghdadi said that his network’s aim was to rebuild tribal alliances in order to make a comeback in Sunni areas from which it had retreated in 2007-2008. “The Ministry of War has mobilised its sons and mujahideen brigades and their military groups in a new blessed foray in the holy month of Ramadan,” the ISI statement said. “Simultaneous and co-ordinated jihadist operations have swept across the country in a spate which stunned the enemy, made him lose his sense and showed the failure of intelligence and security plans which filled the world with noise and bluster.” The bloodshed coincided with an intensifying of the conflict in neighbouring Syria. Iraqi officials have warned that Al Qaeda militants are passing in and out of Syria through the 680 km border between the two countries, and Baghdad has sent troops and tanks to the frontier to strengthen security. From: Gulf today