Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki failed to maintain discipline and control over his military forces in the matter of the demonstrations held by Sunni Arabs in the city of Ramadi in western Iraq. As a result, four were killed and nearly 40 wounded when Iraqi troops opened fire with live ammunition in Fallujah, the capital of western Iraq. This took place on Friday, Jan. 25, 2013 just before the protesters launched a two-week sit-in bearing the name “No Retreat.” It was immediately followed up by reports that three Iraqi soldiers had been kidnapped and two more killed in the same region.

According to the protesters’ version of events, some of them left the main roadway leading to the area of the sit-in in the town of Ramadi and began to head toward the military base located some three kilometers away. They chanted against Maliki and threw rocks and water bottles at the soldiers. Half an hour later, the soldiers decided to open fire upon them.

The Iraqi military’s version of events, however, claims that they were subjected to an armed attack which killed two and wounded eight.

Hussain al-Shahristani, Iraq's deputy prime minister for energy and the prime minister’s representative to the parliament, announced that “two of the martyrs of Fallujah were from al-Qaeda.” He went on to elaborate that they were killed attacking an army checkpoint far removed from the square where the protesters had congregated, and that afterward their corpses were brought to the square so that they could be counted as among the martyrs of the protest.