iraq tries novel ways to curb violence

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In this picture taken on Sept. 9, 2013, Iraqi army soldiers guard a moat surrounding the oil-rich Iraqi city of Kirkuk, 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Baghdad, Iraq. Iraqi authorities are resorting to desperate measures to quell rising violence, ordering huge numbers of cars off the road in the capital, bulldozing soccer fields and even building a medieval-style moat around a disputed northern city in an effort to keep car bombs out. (AP Photo/Emad Matti)

BAGHDAD (AP) -- Iraqi authorities are resorting to desperate measures to quell rising violence, ordering huge numbers of cars off the roads, bulldozing soccer fields and even building a medieval-style moat around one city in an effort to keep car bombs out.

Many Iraqis question the security benefits of the heavy-handed efforts, lampooning them online and complaining that they only add to the daily struggle of living in a country weathering its worst bout of bloodshed in half a decade.

Over the weekend, authorities began banning several hundred thousand vehicles from Baghdad streets each day in a bid to stop the increasing number of car bombings. Cars with license plates ending in odd numbers are allowed on the streets one day, followed by cars with even-numbered plates the next. Government cars, taxis, trucks and a few other categories of vehicles are exempted from the policy.

"Easing the traffic load on checkpoints will make it easier for security forces to search vehicles without causing long lines," an Interior Ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because he is not authorized to speak to the media. Big backlogs of cars, he said, "put pressure on the security forces to do hasty searches."