BAGHDAD — The ethnic and sectarian tensions that threaten to tear Iraq apart flared Wednesday as the prime minister accused the Kurdish self-rule region of harboring the Sunni militants who have overrun much of the country, and 50 bodies were found dumped in a village south of Baghdad.
It was not clear who the men were or why they were killed. Such grisly scenes were common during the darkest days of the Iraq war, and the deaths raised fears of another round of sectarian bloodletting. Many of the victims were bound, blindfolded and shot in the head.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s allegations, made in his weekly televised address, are likely to worsen Baghdad’s already thorny relationship with the Kurds, whose fighters have been battling insurgents over the past month.
The accusations would also seem to dampen the prospect of reconciliation that the United States, the United Nations and even Iraq’s top Shiite cleric say is necessary to bridge the country’s ethnic and sectarian divisions and hold Iraq together.
The jihadis have been joined in their assault by other Sunni insurgents, feeding off the anger in their minority community against the Shiite-led government. On the other side, Shiite militias have rallied around al-Maliki’s government to fight off the insurgents.
In the far north, Iraq’s Kurds have taken advantage of the mayhem to seize disputed territory — including the city of Kirkuk, a major oil center — and move closer to a long-held dream of their own state.
Last week, the president of the Kurdish area urged the region’s lawmakers to move on preparations for a referendum on independence. These moves have infuriated al-Maliki, who is under pressure from opponents as well as former allies to step down.
Speaking Wednesday, al-Maliki took aim at the Kurds, whose regional government is based in Irbil, saying, “Everything that has been changed on the ground must be returned.”
He went a step further, saying: “We can’t stay silent over Irbil being a headquarters for Daesh, Baath, al-Qaeda and the terrorists.” Daesh is the acronym in Arabic for the Islamic State group, while Baath was the party of former dictator Saddam Hussein.
A spokesman for the Kurdistan Regional Government, Safeen Dizayee, called al-Maliki’s accusations “baseless.”
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