Insurgents killed 10 people in a wave of attacks across Baghdad Thursday as U.S. Defense Secretary Rumsfeld urged Iraqis to form a national unity government to lessen the threat of civil war.
Rumsfeld says authorities are trying to stop the sectarian violence gripping Iraq. But he says if a civil war erupts, U.S. authorities plan to have Iraqi security forces, rather than U.S. troops, deal with the violence.
Thursday's attacks in Baghdad come as Iraqi authorities are investigating the abduction of 50 employees of a private security company by unidentified men dressed as Iraqi police commandos.
And Iraqi President Jalal Talabani met with political leaders on resolving a deadlock over forming a new government and holding the first session of Iraq's new parliament as scheduled on Sunday.
Rumsfeld was speaking in Washington during testimony before a Senate committee.
Earlier, the bodies of at least 20 men, most of them strangled, were found in a Sunni area of the Iraqi capital.
In its annual review of global human rights, the U.S. State Department said the vast majority of abuses reportedly carried out by Iraqi government agencies were attributed to the police force.
The report released Wednesday said Iraqi police continue to be linked to arbitrary arrests, rape and torture that sometimes lead to the death of detainees. It said police units are often infiltrated and even dominated by sectarian militias.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.