Allawi sees Iraq mired in 'unfortunate civil war'

Iraqi children sit inside a small room that was turned into their house at the premises of the destroyed Iraqi Air Force Club yesterday. Three years after the US-led war against Iraq that started on March 20, 2003, scores of displaced people are still living among the ruins of the club that was one of the luxurious leisure of the elite of former dictator Saddam Hussein's regime. PHOTO: AFP

"It is unfortunate that we are in civil war," Allawi told BBC television on the eve of the third anniversary of the US and British invasion that overthrew Saddam Hussein's dictatorship.

"We are losing each day an average 50 to 60 people throughout the country, if not more," he said. "If this is not civil war, then God knows what civil war is."

Allawi's comments were made as 12 Iraqis were killed on Sunday in insurgent attacks, including a drive-by shooting, and a US raid north of Baghdad, security sources said.

His views meanwhile contrasted with those of British Defence Secretary John Reid, who on Saturday had insisted that civil war in Iraq was neither imminent nor probable despite increased violence between factions.

"There is no civil war, it isn't imminent, it isn't likely, although there has been an increase in sectarian violence," Reid told Sky News television from Iraq, where he had Friday met with his Iraqi counterpart Saadun al-Dulaimi.