Surge: 7 more American troops killed in Iraq
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- Date: 22 Mar 2007 21:44:51 GMT
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Surge: 7 more American troops killed in Iraq
Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit
AP - Mar 18, 2007
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/I/IRAQ?SITE=NYMID&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT
7 more American troops killed in Iraq
By LAUREN FRAYER
Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD (AP) -- The U.S. military on Sunday announced the deaths of
seven more troops in Iraq, including four killed by a roadside bomb
while patrolling western Baghdad - the latest American casualties in a
month-long security crackdown in the capital.
Though violence has receded slightly in the capital, a car bomb killed
eight Iraqis in a predominantly Shiite district on Sunday, police said.
The attack targeted people cooking food at open-air grills in the
street, to offer as charity on a Shiite Muslim holiday commemorating
the anniversary of the Prophet Muhammad's death. Police said 28 others
were wounded in the attack.
A U.S. official, meanwhile, blamed al-Qaida in Iraq for chlorine bomb
attacks that struck villagers in Anbar province earlier this week but
said tight Iraqi security measures prevented a higher number of
casualties.
The attacks killed at least two people and sickened 350 Iraqi civilians
and six U.S. troops, the U.S. military said Saturday.
U.S. military spokesman Rear Adm. Mark Fox said at least one of the
attackers detonated his explosives after he was unable to get past an
Iraqi police checkpoint in Amiriyah, just south of Fallujah, killing
only himself. Fox conceded that many Iraqis were exposed to the
chemical fumes but insisted that steps Iraqi security forces were
increasingly effective.
"Insurgent attempts to create high-profile carnage are being stopped at
checkpoints across the country," he said at a news conference in
Baghdad.
Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh appealed to Iraqis to help
stop the violence.
"Opportunity is still available to all honest Iraqis to rescue this
country from the criminals," he said at a joint news conference with
Fox. "The chlorine attack was a kind of punishment against the people
who stood against terrorist organizations."
There is a growing power struggle between insurgents and Sunnis who
oppose them in Anbar, the center of the insurgency, which stretches
from Baghdad to the borders with Syria, Saudi Arabia and Jordan. The
Anbar assaults came three days after Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a
Shiite, traveled there, hoping to reach out to Sunni clan chiefs and to
undermine tribal support for the insurgency.
After the explosion that killed four U.S. soldiers on Saturday, the
unit came under fire and another soldier was wounded. During this
month's crackdown in the capital, the battalion had found eight weapons
caches and two roadside bombs and helped rescue a kidnap victim, the
military said.
An explosion in Diyala province northeast of Baghdad killed another
soldier Saturday and injured five. A U.S. Marine also was killed
Saturday in fighting in Anbar, according to a separate statement. A
seventh service member died Saturday in a non-combat related incident,
the military said.
Saturday's deaths brought to at least 3,217 members of the U.S.
military who have died since the Iraq war started in March 2003,
according to an Associated Press count.
A Web video surfaced Sunday showing an alleged insurgent crawling under
a U.S. military vehicle in Iraq and purportedly planting explosives.
Seconds later, the video cuts to an explosion ripping the vehicle apart.
The footage was stamped with the emblem of the Islamic State of Iraq,
an al-Qaida-linked militant group that disavows Iraq's elected
government and seeks to establish Muslim law.
The video was posted on an Islamic Web site that frequently airs
insurgent messages, but its contents and authenticity could not be
independently verified.
In violence Sunday, gunmen opened fire on a minibus carrying civilians
northeast of Baghdad, killing seven men and wounding four others,
police said. The attack occurred in Hibhib, just east of Baqouba, in
the area where al-Qaida in Iraqi leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed
in a U.S. airstrike on June 7.
A roadside bomb also hit an Iraqi police convoy in eastern Baghdad,
killing two policemen and wounding five, authorities said. Later,
police said a mortar round landed near a house in central Baghdad,
killing a civilian and wounding another.
In Shorja market, Baghdad's most popular central shopping district, a
man tossed a grenade into a group of workers, police said. One worker
was killed and another was wounded. The suspect escaped through an
alley, they said.
The Shorja market, which has been attacked several times, was turned
into a pedestrian zone after a U.S.-Iraqi security crackdown began in
Baghdad on Feb. 14.
An abandoned hotel exploded Sunday in an industrial area of Fallujah,
40 miles west of Baghdad. Police said insurgents had planted bombs in
the three-story building and then detonated it at dawn.
Iraqi troops had taken over part of the building's roof as a base,
police said. There were no reports of casualties.
In Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, fighting erupted between U.S.
troops and elements of the Shiite Mahdi Army, police said. There were
no reports of casualties, and the U.S. military had no immediate
comment.
Eleven bodies were found - six in Baqouba, one in Diwaniyah and four in
Mosul - many with signs of torture and all apparently victims of
sectarian killings.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military said American troops captured 12 suspected
militants Sunday in raids across Iraq, all accused of plotting attacks
on U.S. troops.
Fox, the U.S. military spokesman, also said Iraqi forces acting on a
tip found a huge weapons cache Friday on the outskirts of the northern
city of Mosul, including 1,800 pounds of bulk explosives.
He said the military was seeing "glimmers of good signs" in the
security sweep that began in mid-February to quell sectarian violence
in Baghdad.
© 2007 The Associated
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