BAGHDAD — More than 60 people were killed and dozens wounded in mortar strikes, drive-by shootings, roadside explosions, suicide bombings and other violent attacks in Iraq on Thursday, as a new study warned that the country was close to becoming a ‘failed state.’ The U.S. ambassador to Iraq, Ryan C. Crocker, said the country had tread close to ‘the edge of the abyss’ but now was making progress on political reforms needed to help mend sectarian and ethnic rifts that have pushed the country to the brink of civil war. Crocker cited what he said was Iraqi political progress toward agreements on constitutional reforms, the sharing of oil revenue and allowing former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath political party to take government and other public jobs. U.S. officials hope political compromises among Iraq’s Shiites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds will complement a U.S. troop buildup in the capital and help to improve Iraq’s security situation. Contrary to Crocker’s assessment, some critics say that political progress has been too slow, while military counterinsurgency strategies have achieved mixed results, reducing some kinds of sectarian violence — such as killings by death squads — but having little impact on others, such […]