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17.11.04, 20:25
Car Bomber Attacks U.S. Convoy in Iraq
By KATARINA KRATOVAC
BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A suicide attacker drove his bomb-laden car into a U.S.
convoy during fighting Wednesday in a northern town, where hospital officials
said at least 10 people were killed amid a wave of violence across Iraq's
Sunni Arab heartland.
The increasing attacks and the U.S. military's offensive to retake the
insurgent stronghold of Fallujah have made November one of Iraq's bloodiest
months.
According to an Associated Press tally, the American death toll in the war in
Iraq surpassed 1,200 with new Defense Department identifications Tuesday night
and Wednesday. The total of 1,206 deaths included 1,202 identified members of
the U.S. military, three military civilians and one unidentified soldier
reported to have died Tuesday in Balad.
In Fallujah, heavy machine-gun fire and explosions rang out in south-central
parts of the city as U.S. Marines hunted remaining fighters. In the northern
Jolan neighborhood, U.S. Marines fought insurgents who officers said had
sneaked back into the city by swimming across the Euphrates River.
Bullets snapped overhead, and Iraqis collecting bodies of the dead ran for
cover behind walls and in buildings as Marines returned fire. After 15 minutes
of fighting, three insurgents were dead and one Marine was slightly injured in
the hand, officers said.
The rush of warplanes streaking through the low-lying clouds shook the city
and blasts sent smoke into the sky. The U.S. military said that airstrikes
Wednesday were concentrated in southwestern Fallujah, destroying enemy positions.
The U.S. military says it is fighting pockets of insurgents after taking most
of Fallujah.
A police spokesman in Karbala said a police officer from the city had reported
that 31 policemen returning from training in Jordan were kidnapped over the
weekend by insurgents who attacked their hotel in western Iraq. The spokesman
said the report was not confirmed.
The Interior Ministry and the office of Prime Minister Ayad Allawi said they
have not been able to confirm the report. A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy in
Amman said he had not heard the report.
The police officer who made the report said he escaped a raid Sunday by armed
men on the hotel in the town of Rutba, near the Jordan border, according to
the police spokesman.
The officer said around 20 armed men attacked the hotel, covering the
captives' heads with black bags and tying their hands before dragging them
away, the spokesman said. The officer said he was beaten but was not abducted.
The car bomb came during clashes in Beiji, a city 155 miles north of the
capital, witnesses said. The vehicle hit a convoy and exploded, then U.S.
soldiers opened fire.
Ten people were killed and nine others wounded, hospital officials said,
though it was not clear how many were caused by the blast. The 1st Infantry
Division said three U.S. soldiers were wounded in the suicide attack. Beiji is
the site of Iraq's largest oil refinery and a major power station.
Meanwhile, Iraqi security forces, backed by U.S. Marines, freed a captive
Iraqi truck driver during a raid south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. The
rescued hostage, who was not identified, was taken to a nearby U.S. base,
where he was treated and released.
In Baghdad, some 3,000 protesters peacefully demanded the release of seven
followers of Shiite Ayatollah Mahmoud al-Hassani, who had been detained by
U.S. forces in the past week.
The northern city of Mosul, where insurgents launched an uprising last week,
appeared calmer, the military said Wednesday, after a U.S. assault to restore
control. On a handful of small arms attacks continued, the military said.
The U.S. military said it was expanding its investigation into the fatal
shooting of a wounded man by a Marine in a Fallujah mosque over the weekend.
The investigation will also look into whether other wounded men in the mosque
were also shot and killed, a spokesman said.
The probe was prompted by videotaped pool pictures by NBC that showed the
shooting during an operation of the 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment in the
mosque on Saturday.
Allawi is ``very concerned'' about the shooting, his office said. American and
Iraqi authorities have been trying to stem outrage over the shootings among
Iraqis, particularly the Sunni Arab minority, and Arabs across the region.
U.S. Ambassador John Negroponte expressed regret over the shooting but said it
should not undermine U.S. efforts to remove guerrillas from the city.
11/17/04 13:01
