Iraq mass graves yield 100 bodies

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi security forces have found more than 100 bodies in two mass graves, military officials said on Sunday.

Fifty bodies were found in a mass grave in central Iraq on Sunday, a military source in the area said, and another team said it had discovered more than 50 bodies in a grave south of Baghdad on April 17.

The grave found on Sunday was in the village of al-Guba, 80 km north of Baghdad, in the troubled Diyala province, where al Qaeda Sunni Arab militants have regrouped after being driven out of other parts of the country.

Most of the bodies had their hands bound and gunshot wounds in the head. Some were decomposed, according to the military source, who declined to be named.

A senior security spokesman in Baghdad, Major-General Qassim Moussawi, said police and Iraqi military had uncovered 51 bodies in a grave on April 17 in Mahmudiya, a town 30 km south of Baghdad.

"We received information from some citizens that there are bodies in the al-Askari neighbourhood in Mahmudiya. We searched the neighbourhood and found the bodies," Moussawi said.

He added that security forces had taken them to the morgue of a local hospital and some families had already identified the victims as their relatives.