The Iraqi prime minister vowed Monday to seek punishment for the Blackwater guards accused of killing 17 people at a busy Baghdad intersection after US courts dropped the case in a decision that outraged many Iraqis. Nuri Al-Maliki's comments were his first public reaction since a US judge threw out the case against the five Blackwater guards last week. The guards were accused of an unprovoked attack that left 17 dead. The killings inflamed anti-American sentiment and solidified many Iraqis' image of US security contractors as above the law. “We have done what is necessary to protect our citizens and to punish those who committed the crime and we have formed committees and filed a lawsuit against Blackwater security firm either in America or Iraq. We won't abandon our right to punish this firm,” Maliki said. The prime minister spoke during a visit to the southern city of Najaf to meet with the Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, who is considered the most influential Shiite cleric in the country. Blackwater had been hired by the State Department to protect US diplomats in Iraq. The guards said they were ambushed but US prosecutors and many Iraqis said the Blackwater guards unleashed an unprovoked attack on civilians using machine guns and grenades. The case drove a wedge between the US and Iraq, which was perceived powerless to protect its people against the plethora of private security contractors that had sprung up since the Iraq war began. Iraqi officials have pledged to pursue the case but it was not immediately clear exactly what legal means they intended to use. Dozens of Iraqis have filed a separate lawsuit alleging that Blackwater employees engaged in indiscriminate killings and beatings. That case is still before a Virginia court. The shootings led the Iraqi government to strip the North Carolina-based company of its license to work in the country, and Blackwater replaced its management and changed its name to Xe Services. Meanwhile, in Washington prosecutors who mishandled the investigation into a deadly 2007 Blackwater Worldwide shooting face a possible misconduct citation from a judge who says they withheld evidence and violated the guards' constitutional rights. US District Judge Ricardo Urbina admonished the Justice Department last week for its “reckless” handling of the investigation into the shooting.
