BAGHDAD — Despite the (daily) violence, US officials have discounted talk of civil war. However, a senior Iraqi official said Saturday that an ‘undeclared civil war’ had already been raging for more than a year. ‘Is there a civil war? Yes, there is an undeclared civil war that has been there for a year or more,’ Maj. Gen. Hussain Kamal told the Associated Press. ‘All these bodies that are discovered in Baghdad, the slaughter of pilgrims heading to holy sites, the explosions, the destruction, the attacks against the mosques are all part of this.’ Kamal said the country would still be spared from all-out sectarian war ‘if a strong government is formed, if the security forces are given wide powers and if they are able to defeat the (resistance to the occupation).’ ‘Then we might be able to overcome this crisis,’ he said. On Saturday, The New York Times reported in its online edition that an internal staff report by the US embassy and the military command rated overall stability of six of Iraq’s 18 provinces ‘serious’ and one ‘critical.’ The report was dated January 31, the Times said. The newspaper said provinces where overall stability was […]