DOZENS of Sunni militants set up a roadblock on a highway north of Baghdad, stopped trucks, checked IDs and then summarily executed 14 Shi'ite drivers, officials say.
The attack early on Thursday was reminiscent of the darkest days of the Sunni-Shi'ite sectarian bloodshed in Iraq in 2006-07, when thousands of people were killed due to their religious affiliation or forced to abandon their homes under threat of death.
Lingering tensions between Sunnis and Shi'ites have been inflamed by persistent violence in Iraq and the civil war in neighbouring Syria, and there are growing fears that Iraq is slipping back toward all-out sectarian conflict.
Two local officials said some 150 militants carried out a coordinated operation during the night that included the highway killings, in the area of Sulaiman Bek, a town north of Baghdad.
The militants began by attacking the town itself with mortar rounds, rocket-propelled grenades and automatic weapons late on Wednesday.
That attack drew security forces away from the highway connecting Baghdad with north Iraq, after which a group of around 40 militants broke off and set up the checkpoint.
They only maintained it for about half an hour but were able to stop dozens of truck drivers, killing 14 execution-style who were Shi'ites.
"These criminals belong to what is called the Islamic State of Iraq, and they targeted Shi'ite drivers and left the Sunnis," local official Shalal Abdul Baban told AFP, referring to an Al-Qaeda front group.
"It was killing by ID," he said.
Iraqi identification cards list a person's name and place of birth, from which their religious affiliation can be surmised.
The entire operation including the attack on the town, in which at least one person was wounded, lasted for about three hours, after which the militants withdrew.
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