Iraqis celebrate New Year with lower death toll

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - There has been a dramatic drop in the number of Iraqi civilians killed, new figures showed, a fact underlined by boisterous New Year celebrations in some parts of Baghdad that saw fireworks lighting up the night sky.

Data compiled by the interior, health and defense ministries showed 481 civilians died violently in Iraq in December, a 75 percent drop from the 1,930 who were killed in December 2006, when a wave of sectarian bloodshed threatened civil war.

The decline in violence has been attributed to a new U.S. counter-insurgency strategy that saw 30,000 more troops sent to Iraq in 2007, a rebellion by Sunni Arab tribes against al Qaeda and a ceasefire declared by anti-American Shi'ite cleric and militia leader Moqtada al Sadr.

Despite the improved security, the New Year celebrations in Baghdad were largely confined to districts on the safer, eastern bank of the Tigris River that splits the capital in two.

"Violence has decreased in my area, but we are still afraid of facing death any minute," said Mustafa Hameed al-Nuami, 40, a civil servant living in the Mansour district of western Baghdad.

"What celebrations? My area is still dead," said Abu Zahra, a Shi'ite from al-Bayaa, a religiously mixed district in western Baghdad where numerous roadblocks make travel difficult.

On the other side of the river, Iraqis partied past midnight at the city's landmark Sheraton and Palestine hotels. In Palestine Street, a popular shopping area in eastern Baghdad, young men danced in the street, banged drums and filmed each other on their mobile phones.

In Karrada, the downtown Baghdad shopping neighborhood, young people came out with fireworks to celebrate the New Year, laughing and spraying each other with aerosol foam.

At the stroke of midnight, exuberant locals opened fire with automatic rifles and heavier caliber weapons, sending red tracer fire criss-crossing the night sky amid bursts of fireworks made more vivid by a power cut that darkened the city.

HOPE, OPTIMISM

A year ago, such scenes would have been unthinkable in a country racked by violence that by the most conservative estimates has killed tens of thousands of people and displaced some 4 million.

After witnessing horrific violence between majority Shi'ite Muslims and once-dominant Sunnis, Iraqis entered 2007 with a sense of doom, but among those celebrating New Year in Baghdad on Monday night there was hope and optimism.

"The celebrations last year were unsafe, but this year they are beautiful. I am optimistic that the security plan is succeeding and the situation will get better," said Um Ali, one of the revelers in Palestine Street.

Levels of violence are sharply down in most parts of Iraq, although the top U.S. military commander, General David Petraeus, warned at the weekend that military gains were fragile and reversible without political reconciliation between Iraq's Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish communities to cement them.

The main political blocs have so far failed to agree on key laws seen by Washington as crucial to boosting reconciliation.

Petraeus said Sunni Islamist al Qaeda remained a major threat to Iraq's security. Analysts also worry that a power struggle between Shi'ite factions in the oil-producing south has the potential to unleash a new wave of violence.

Despite the dramatic drop in violence in December, the figures released on Monday showed more civilians died overall in 2007 (16,232) than in 2006 (12,360).

Some 1,300 policemen and 432 soldiers were also killed this year, along with 4,544 militants, according to the data. In 2006, 602 soldiers were killed and 1,231 police.

December was also one of the least deadly months of the four-year-old war for U.S. soldiers, with 21 reported deaths so far. In December 2006, 112 U.S. soldiers were killed.

(Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed and Aws Qusay; Editing by Catherine Evans)