By Ahmed Rasheed and Saif Hameed
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraq's parliament suspended its meeting on Tuesday amid protests by Sunni Muslim MPs over violence that targeted their community in eastern Iraq and left dozens killed in apparent retaliation for anti-Shi'ite bombings claimed by Islamic State.
A statement by Sunni lawmakers urged Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi to disband and disarm the Shi'ite militias which they accuse of being behind the latest attacks that targeted the town of Muqdadiya.
Raad al-Dahlaki and Nahida al-Daini, two Sunni MPs from Diyala province where Muqdadiya is located, said 43 people have been killed over the past week in the town and nine mosques were fire bombed. Salah Muzahim, another MP, said the toll was over 40 dead.
Rising sectarian violence would represent a further challenge to Abadi, a moderate Shi'ite who is trying to reconcile the Sunnis and win them over to fight Islamic State, the ultra-hardline Sunni group which declared a caliphate in 2014 over large, mainly Sunni Muslim swathes of Iraq and Syria.
"The Iraqi Forces Coalition... as the representative of the Sunni component in Iraq, announces... its members' boycott of the next two sessions of parliament and government in condemnation of what is happening in Muqdadiya," said a statement read by MP Ahmed Masari, referring to attacks on residents in the town 80 kilometres (50 miles) northeast of Baghdad.
"We demand the dissolution and disarmament of the (Shi'ite) militias," the statement said. Lawmakers met briefly on Tuesday and decided to adjourn until Thursday.
Iraq's Interior Ministry has not published a toll for Sunni casualties in Muqdadiya and the neighbouring villages in Diyala province. The ministry's spokesman was not available to give details on the latest upsurge in violence.
Badr Organization, the Iranian-backed Shi'ite militia which is dominant in Diyala, said the casualty figures quoted by the Sunni MPs were incorrect.
"Yes, there are people killed but this number is exaggerated," Mohammed Naji, an aide to Badr leader Hadi al-Amiri, told Reuters.
He described the attacks on Sunni mosques as violations by people who want to stir up sectarian tension in Diyala, which lies between Baghdad and the Iranian border, and has a mixed population of Shi'ites and Sunnis.
Shi'ite militiamen deployed in Muqdadiya after two blasts killed 23 people in a coffee shop where they usually meet. Islamic State claimed the attacks, saying they targeted Shi'ites.
The level of violence in Muqdadiya has receded but tension remains as the town is still under the control of Shi'ite militiamen, MPs Dahlaki and Daini said.
Badr Organisation has established itself as the ascendant militia in the region since rolling back Islamic State's advance in 2014. Amiri last week expressed regret over the sectarian violence and offered to rebuild the destroyed Sunni mosques.
Many Sunnis fled their homes there when Badr advanced to roll back Islamic State.
(Reporting by Ahmed Rasheed, Saif Hameed and Stephen Kalin; Writing by Maher Chmaytelli; Editing by Samia Nakhoul and Dominic Evans)
