down with murder inc

Bush upset with Iraq killings reports
By NEDRA PICKLER, Associated Press WASHINGTON - Yahoo news
President Bush promised on Wednesday that any Marines involved in the alleged murders of Iraqi civilians will be punished. A senior officer said the case could undermine Iraqis' support for the presence of American troops.
"I am troubled by the initial news stories," Bush said in his first public comments about the deaths of about two dozen civilians at Haditha last January. "I'm mindful that there's a thorough investigation going on. If in fact, laws were broken, there will be punishment."
Military investigators have evidence that points toward unprovoked murders by Marines, a senior defense official said last week.
The shootings came after a bomb rocked a military convoy on Nov. 19, killing a Marine. Residents of Haditha said Marines then went into nearby houses and shot members of two families, including a 3-year-old girl.
At first, the American military described what happened as an ambush on a joint U.S.-Iraqi patrol, with a roadside bombing and subsequent firefight killing 15 civilians, eight insurgents and a Marine. The statement said the 15 civilians were killed by the blast, a claim the residents strongly denied.
With some in Congress alleging a cover-up, the Bush administration offered assurances the facts will be made public.
Bush's spokesman, Tony Snow, urged patience as the Marines conduct what he called a vigorous investigation. He said a report will come out in "a matter of weeks, not a matter of months" and include public release of photographic evidence. "We're going to see everything," Snow said.
Once that investigation is completed, a senior Marine commander in Iraq will decide whether to press charges of murder or other violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
At the Pentagon, Army Brig. Gen. Carter Ham would not discuss any aspect of the probe, but he stressed the potential harm caused by allegations alone.
"Allegations such as this, regardless of how they are borne out by the facts, can have an effect on the ability of U.S. forces to continue to operate," said Ham, a deputy operations director for the Joint Staff and a former commander of U.S. forces in northern Iraq.
"We do rely very heavily - and more importantly, the Iraqi security forces rely heavily - on the support from the Iraqi people," Ham said. "And anything that tends to diminish that, obviously, is not helpful to what we're trying to do."
The toll of Iraqi civilians climbed on Wednesday when two women, including one being taken to a maternity hospital, died when coalition troops shot at a car that failed to stop at an observation post in a city north of Baghdad. The U.S. military said the vehicle entered a clearly marked prohibited area but failed to obey repeated warnings.
The president was asked about the Haditha allegations during a photo opportunity with the president of Rwanda, Paul Kagame.
Bush said he had discussed Haditha with Gen. Peter Pace, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff. "He's a proud Marine. And nobody is more concerned about these allegations than the Marine Corps. The Marine Corps is full of honorable people who understand the rules of war."
"If in fact these allegations are true," Bush said, "the Marine Corps will work hard to make sure that that culture - that proud culture - will be reinforced. And that those who violated the law, if they did, will be punished."
Until now the most infamous violation of military law in Iraq was the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse involving Army soldiers, which came to light in April 2004. Bush said last week he considered Abu Ghraib to be the most costly U.S. mistake of the war.

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 1
*BAGHDAD - Several mortar bombs exploded on the southern edge of Baghdad, killing at least nine people and injuring 43, police sources said.
*BAGHDAD - A ruling party official in Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region accused Turkish forces on Thursday of shelling villages inside Iraq and said one shepherd was injured in Wednesday's incident.
BAGHDAD - Two labourers were killed and 21 injured when a roadside bomb went off in the al-Tayaran square in central Baghdad, a Ministry of Interior source said.
BAGHDAD - The bodies of four people were found in two different districts of the capital, a Ministry of Interior source said.
KERBALA - Gunmen gunned down a policeman on Wednesday in the Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad, police said.
KERBALA - The police found the body of an old man who had been shot dead in Kerbala, police said.
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi police and army forces launched new Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's "iron fist" security crackdown in Basra against gangs and feuding Shi'ite factions threatening vital oil exports.
*BAGHDAD - Al Qaeda militants have gained ground in Ramadi and the 1,500 extra U.S. troops that have arrived in Iraq to help fight them will be used to try and break their grip in the town, the U.S. military said.
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki condemned on Thursday as a "terrible crime" a suspected massacre of civilians by U.S. Marines in the Iraqi town of Haditha last year.
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said he will go to parliament on Sunday to present his candidates for interior and defence ministers as political blocs remain deadlocked.
*BAGHDAD - A top U.S. commander ordered combat troops to be trained to abide by moral standards on the battlefield, an apparent response to allegations Marines killed civilians in Haditha. - alertnet.org

Iraq PM declares state of emergency in Basra
By Aref Mohammed Wed May 31, BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - yahoo.com
Iraq's new prime minister declared a one-month state of emergency in the city of Basra on Wednesday, vowing to strike with an "iron fist" against gangs and feuding Shi'ite factions threatening vital oil exports.
"We have ordered the army unit (in Basra) to deploy in the streets," Nuri al-Maliki told reporters in Iraq's second city, which is in the grip of a fierce power struggle. "We call this month the month of security in Basra," the no-nonsense Shi'ite Islamist said, 11 days after taking office. "We hope after this month that we will come back to Basra and see that the situation has improved a lot."
Iraqi forces will patrol Basra day and night, search for weapons and set up checkpoints, a government source said.
Maliki, who took office on May 20 pledging to rein in relentless violence plaguing Iraq, also announced the formation of a four-person security committee to deal with the situation in Basra during the state of emergency.
Security has deteriorated sharply in Basra over the past year as Shi'ite groups tussle for a share of the power handed to the majority by the U.S. overthrow of Saddam Hussein's Sunni- dominated administration three years ago.
It was not immediately clear whether British troops patrolling Iraq's mainly Shi'ite south, including Basra, would play any role in the security operation.
"IRON FIST"
Maliki, who was heading a high-level government delegation to Basra to restore stability, earlier vowed to crack down on groups threatening security and oil exports.
Basra, whose oil accounts for virtually all of Iraq's state revenues, is a major prize for all parties.
Stressing Basra was crucial for the country, Maliki told local leaders in an address broadcast live on television: "We will beat with an iron fist on the heads of gangs who are manipulating security ... Security is first, second and third."
Maliki is a leading member of the ruling, but fractious, Shi'ite Islamist United Alliance.
The main Alliance factions in Basra's power struggle are the armed Badr organization, the governor's Fadhila party and the movement of cleric and militia leader Moqtada al-Sadr. A source close to Fadhila warned last week it could halt oil exports.
Washington hopes Maliki's grand coalition of Shi'ites, minority Sunni Arabs and Kurds will tackle widespread guerrilla and sectarian violence that threatens to tear Iraq apart.
But there is little sign of any let-up in the cycle of killings and revenge attacks, with a spate of bombings claiming at least 100 lives this week, mainly in Baghdad. Most of the victims were civilians.
Police said they had found 42 bodies over the last 24 hours in different parts of the capital -- bound, tortured and shot.
Also in Baghdad, gunmen killed Ali Jaafar, sports anchorman for Iraqi state television, as he left his home, police said.
Several journalists from the government-funded station have been targeted by insurgents waging a violent campaign to topple U.S.-backed Iraqi leaders.
IRAQ'S "MY LAI"
U.S. military officials say the killing of 24 civilians in the town of Haditha last year appears to have been an unprovoked attack by U.S. Marines, after an investigation found the victims died of gunshot wounds, The New York Times reported.
The findings contradicted Marines' claims that the civilians were victims of a roadside bomb, the newspaper said.
The report, citing an unidentified senior military official in Iraq, said the investigation in February and March led by Colonel Gregory Watt uncovered death certificates showing they were shot mostly in the head and chest.
"There were enough inconsistencies that things didn't add up," the senior official was quoted as saying by the Times.
Residents of Haditha, 200 km (125 miles) northwest of Baghdad in an area that has seen much activity by Sunni Arab insurgents, have told Reuters that U.S. Marines attacked houses after their patrol was hit by a roadside bomb.
U.S. commentators talk of "Iraq's My Lai" and wonder if Haditha could have a similar effect as the 1968 massacre in Vietnam on public attitudes to the military and the war.
In Baghdad, Saddam's defense attorneys accused the prosecution of trying to buy a witness and putting someone on the stand who perjured himself at the trial for crimes against humanity after a failed assassination bid on Saddam in 1982.
Speaking from behind a curtain to hide his identity, a defense witness accused chief prosecutor Jaafar al-Moussawi of offering him money in 2004 to give false testimony.
"One day they took me to a room where I met someone and he said: 'What you are saying is not good for us or the Iraqi people. We want to have the tyrant Saddam executed'," he said.
Moussawi denied this and asked the court to prosecute the witness.

U.S. troops kill pregnant woman in Iraq
By KIM GAMEL, Associated Press BAGHDAD, Iraq - yahoo.com
U.S. forces killed two Iraqi women - one of them about to give birth - when the troops shot at a car that failed to stop at an observation post in a city north of Baghdad, Iraqi officials and relatives said Wednesday. Nabiha Nisaif Jassim, 35, was being raced to the maternity hospital in Samarra by her brother when the shooting occurred Tuesday.
Jassim, the mother of two children, and her 57-year-old cousin, Saliha Mohammed Hassan, were killed by the U.S. forces, according to police Capt. Laith Mohammed and witnesses.
The U.S. military said coalition troops fired at a car after it entered a clearly marked prohibited area near an observation post but failed to stop despite repeated visual and auditory warnings.
"Shots were fired to disable the vehicle," the military said in a statement e-mailed to The Associated Press. "Coalition forces later received reports from Iraqi police that two women had died from gunshot wounds ... and one of the females may have been pregnant."
Jassim's brother, who was wounded by broken glass, said he did not see any warnings as he sped his sister to the hospital. Her husband was waiting for her there.
"I was driving my car at full speed because I did not see any sign or warning from the Americans. It was not until they shot the two bullets that killed my sister and cousin that I stopped," he said. "God take revenge on the Americans and those who brought them here. They have no regard for our lives."
He said doctors tried but failed to save the baby after his sister was brought to the hospital.
The shooting deaths occurred in the wake of an investigation into allegations that U.S. Marines killed unarmed civilians in the western city of Haditha.
The U.S. military said the incident in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, was being investigated. The city is in the heart of the so-called Sunni Triangle and has in the past seen heavy insurgent activity.
"The loss of life is regrettable and coalition forces go to great lengths to prevent them," the military said.
The women's bodies were wrapped in sheets and lying on stretchers outside the Samarra General Hospital before being taken to the morgue, while residents pointed to bullet holes on the windshield of a car and a pool of blood on the seat.
Khalid Nisaif Jassim, the pregnant woman's brother, said American forces had blocked off the side road only two weeks ago and news about the observation post had been slow to filter out to rural areas.
He said the killings, like those in Haditha, were examples of random killings faced by Iraqis every day.
The killings at Haditha, a city that has been plagued by insurgents, came after a bomb rocked a military convoy on Nov. 19, killing a Marine. Rep. John Murtha (news, bio, voting record), D-Pa., a decorated war veteran who has been briefed by military officials, has said Marines shot and killed unarmed civilians in a taxi at the scene and went into two homes and shot others.
Military investigators have evidence that points toward unprovoked murders by Marines, a senior defense official said last week.
In his first public comments on the incident, President Bush said he was troubled by the allegations, and that, "If in fact laws were broken, there will be punishment."
Former Iraqi Foreign Minister Adnan Pachachi told the BBC that the allegations have "created a feeling of great shock and sadness and I believe that if what is alleged is true - and I have no reason to believe it's not - then I think something very drastic has to be done."
"There must be a level of discipline imposed on the American troops and change of mentality which seems to think that Iraqi lives are expendable," said Pachachi, a member of parliament.
If confirmed as unjustified killings, the episode could be the most serious case of criminal misconduct by U.S. troops during three years of combat in Iraq. Until now the most infamous occurrence was the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse involving Army soldiers, which came to light in April 2004 and which Bush said he considered to be the worst U.S. mistake of the entire war.
Once the military investigation is completed, perhaps in June, it will be up to a senior Marine commander in Iraq to decide whether to press charges of murder or other violations of the Uniform Code of Military Justice.
The incident has sparked two investigations - one into the deadly encounter itself and another into whether it was the subject of a cover-up. The Marine Corps had initially attributed 15 civilian deaths to the car bombing and a firefight with insurgents, eight of whom the Marines reported had been killed.
"People in Samarra are very angry with the Americans not only because of Haditha case but because the Americans kill people randomly specially recently," Khalid Nisaif Jassim said.

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 3
*BASRA - A car bomb in the southern city of Basra killed at least 28 people and wounded 62, police said. Police sources said the bomb exploded near a market in the centre of the city.
BAGHDAD - A Russian embassy employee was killed in Baghdad and four others kidnapped, Russia's Foreign Ministry and police in the capital said.
BAGHDAD - Police found 22 bodies in different parts of Baghdad with bullet wounds and signs of torture, police said.
BAQUBA - Six policemen were killed and two wounded when gunmen attacked a police checkpoint in central Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead a civilian in central Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
NEAR BAQUBA - Police said they found eight severed heads by the side of a road near Baquba. Documents at the scene indicated that one of them belonged to Sunni preacher Abdulazeez Hameed al-Mashhadani of a mosque in Tarmiya 30 km (20 miles) north of Baghdad.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb exploded near an Iraqi army patrol in central Baghdad, wounding two civilians, police said.
BAGHDAD - Two policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - Gunmen killed three people in an automobile spare parts shop in Baquba, police said.
KIRKUK - Police found the body of a woman beside a highway northwest of Kirkuk.
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS:
BAGHDAD - Iraq's government believes the U.S. military's exoneration of U.S. troops accused of killing civilians in the town of Ishaqi in March was unfair and will press on with its own investigation, an aide to the prime minister said.
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi leaders are expected to ask parliament on Sunday to approve a former Shi'ite army officer as the country's new interior minister and a Sunni army commander as defence minister, government sources said. - alertnet.org

Russian Diplomat Murdered In Baghdad
Jun 3, 2006 8:50 am US/Central - (CBS News) BAGHDAD
A Russian Embassy official in Baghdad said Saturday that one diplomat was killed and four diplomatic employees were abducted in the Iraqi capital.
"Yes, I can confirm this. One diplomat killed, four employees kidnapped. That's all I can say. No commentary," the official, contacted by telephone from Moscow, told The Associated Press. He refused to give his name or provide any further details.
Police in Baghdad said witnesses at the scene told them that gunmen opened fire on a car that belonged to the Russians in west Baghdad's upscale Mansour district.
Interior Ministry Lt. Col. Falah al-Mohamedawi said one person was killed in the incident.
In other recent developments:
* A military investigation into allegations that U.S. troops intentionally killed Iraqi civilians in a March raid in Ishaqi, a village north of Baghdad, has cleared the troops of misconduct, the military said Friday.
* The leader of al Qaeda in Iraq urged Sunnis to confront Shiites and ignore calls for reconciliation in a new audiotape posted on the Web on Friday, saying Shiite militias are killing and raping the Sunni Arab minority. The tape was a four-hour sermon by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi against Shiites, denouncing their top cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani as an "atheist" and saying the community had collaborated with invaders throughout Iraq's history.
* The Pentagon has released the name of the soldier who was killed Monday by the same bomb that took the life of the Iraqi translator he called "Sam" and CBS crew members James Brolan and Paul Douglas, and wounded CBS correspondent Kimberly Dozier. Army Capt. James Funkhouser, 35, had been in Iraq only a few months. He leaves behind a wife, Jennifer, and two daughters, Caitlyn and Allison.
* A military jury on Thursday convicted an Army dog handler of using his animal to torment a prisoner at Abu Ghraib. Sgt. Santos A. Cardona is the 11th soldier convicted of crimes stemming from the abuse of inmates at the prison in late 2003 and early 2004.
* The U.S. military ordered coalition troops in Iraq on Thursday to undergo special training in ethics and "the values that separate us from our enemies" in the wake of allegations that Marines killed two dozen unarmed civilians in Haditha. The order came as Iraq's government launched its own investigation of the deaths last November in the western town as well as other incidents involving U.S. troops.
Iraqi police on Saturday found eight severed heads north of Baghdad with a note indicating at least one of the men were killed in retaliation for the slaying of four Shiite doctors, authorities said.
Five of the slain men were security guards at a hospital complex in the capital who had been arrested by Iraqi police on Thursday, Lt. Col. Adil Al-Zihari of the Diyala police said.
Notes found with the heads near a highway in the Hadid village near the volatile city of Baqouba, 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, said one of those killed was Abdul Aziz al-Sheik Hamad and accused him of killing four Shiite doctors and a former governor during the administrator of former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi.
The heads were transferred in fruit boxes to the morgue in Baqouba, a mixed Sunni Arab-Shiite town that has recently seen an increase in sectarian violence.
Gunmen also ambushed a police checkpoint in the city on Saturday, killing seven policemen and wounding five pedestrians, police said.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, meanwhile, held last-minute negotiations with Sunni and Shiite leaders on the eve of his planned announcement of names for the interior and defense ministers, two weeks after his government of national unity took office.
Al-Maliki promised earlier this week to fill the posts on Sunday, despite failing to reach an agreement on candidates with ethnic and sectarian parties.
The appointments are considered key to his plan to take over the security of Iraq within 18 months, a move that could pave the way for the withdrawal of U.S. forces.
The defense and interior minister posts have been temporarily held by al-Maliki and one of his deputy prime ministers since the Cabinet was sworn in May 20. The Interior Ministry post will go to a Shiite. Sunni Arabs have complained that many Shiite candidates had ties to militias.
Al-Maliki told visiting U.S. congressmen on Friday that "we are keen to march in the correct direction to confront these challenges despite the difficulties."
U.S. House Speaker Dennis Hastert, R-Ill., told al-Maliki that "an important next step is for the Iraqi government to seek national reconciliation in order to end the insurgency and disband the sectarian militias."
Al-Maliki also said that his government was working on a plan to restore security to Ramadi, capital of Anbar province. He said Iraqi forces would work with U.S. troops.
"There is a joint plan between the Iraqi forces and the coalition forces, in addition to the local (Sunni Arab) tribes, to help us bring stability to the city," al-Maliki said of Ramadi.
A U.S. military spokesman said this week that American forces are "very concerned" about the situation in Ramadi because al Qaeda in Iraq is taking advantage of sectarian differences to make inroads in the city west of Baghdad.
Maj. Gen. William Caldwell confirmed earlier that about 1,500 combat troops have been moved from Kuwait to Anbar province to help establish order. He described the deployment as short-term to ensure continuity during summer rotations and said the focus was on quelling the al Qaeda presence in the area to keeping foreign fighters from crossing over from Syria, which borders Anbar

Gunmen Seize at Least 50 at Iraq Bus Stop
BAGHDAD, Iraq (Associated Press) - Jun 5, 7:22 AM EDT-
Gunmen wearing police uniforms raided bus stations in central Baghdad, abducting at least 50 people, including drivers and passengers preparing to travel outside Iraq, an interior ministry official said.
The attackers also seized people working in the area, where several travel agencies are based and buses pick up passengers traveling mostly to Jordan, Syria and Lebanon, Lt. Colonel Falah al-Mohamedawi said.
The victims were herded into more than a dozen vehicles. More details were not immediately available.
In other news, masked gunmen stopped two minivans carrying students north of Baghdad, ordered the passengers off, separated Shiites from Sunni Arabs, and killed the 21 Shiites "in the name of Islam," a witness said.
In predominantly Shiite southern Basra, police hunting for militants stormed a Sunni Arab mosque early Sunday, just hours after a car bombing. The ensuing fire fight killed nine. The two attacks Sunday dealt a blow to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's pledge to curb sectarian violence. He again failed to reach consensus Sunday among Iraq's ethnic and sectarian parties on candidates for interior and defense minister - posts he must fill to implement his ambitious plan to take control of Iraq's security from U.S.-led forces within 18 months.
Violence linked to Shiite and Sunni Arab animosity has grown increasingly worse since Feb. 22, when bombs ravaged the golden dome of a revered Shiite mosque in predominantly Sunni Arab Samarra.
Sectarian tensions have run particularly high in Baghdad, Basra and Diyala province, a mixed Sunni Arab-Shiite region. And Sunday's attacks came just days after terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi renewed his call for Sunni Arabs to take up arms against Shiites, whom he often vilifies as infidels.
On Monday, gunmen in a car killed two Sunni brothers as they were driving to college in the religiously mixed neighborhood of Sadiyah in southwestern Baghdad, police Lt. Maitham Abdul Razzaq said. The victims, Ahmed and Arkan Sarhan were in their early 20s.
Iraqi police also found the blindfolded and bound body of a man who had been shot in the head and chest elsewhere in the capital, Razzaq said.
In the minibus ambush, a car and an SUV stopped the vehicles near the town of Qara Tappah, about 75 miles (120 kilometers) northeast of Baghdad and near Diyala province, electrician Haqi Ismail, 48, told The Associated Press.
Ismail said he had been driving his pickup truck behind the vans and was stopped too. About 15 masked men wearing traditional robes known as a dishdashas forced everyone out of the vehicles, he said.
"They asked us to show our IDs, and then instructed us to stand in a line, separating the Sunni from the Shiite due to the IDs and also due to the faces," said Ismail, a Shiite Kurd.
He said the gunmen ordered the Shiites to lie down and before they opened fire one shouted, "On behalf of Islam, today we will dig a mass grave for you. You are traitors."
Ismail said he was injured but did not move.
"One of the gunmen kicked me to be sure that I was dead," he said, speaking from his hospital bed in Sulaimaniyah, north of Qara Tappah.
Two of the victims were high school students, ages 17 and 18, and nine were students at al-Yarmouk University in Baqouba, ages 21-22, said Qara Tappah's mayor, Serwan Shokir. The rest were men in their mid-to-late 30s, who worked as laborers or for the power company, the mayor said.
The Basra violence - the car bomb Saturday and mosque raid early Sunday - came days after al-Maliki declared a state of emergency in the city, vowing to crack down with an "iron fist" on gangs fighting for power.
Basra police surrounded the al-Arab mosque just after midnight Saturday, tipped off that militants holed up inside had opened fire. Also, Iraqi forces had found two vehicles packed with explosives near the mosque, similar to the car bomb used to attack a crowded market, killing 28 people and wounding 62.
Police and gunmen exchanged fire, killing nine people. Police they arrested six terror suspects, adding that part of the mosque was damaged and burned.
A hard-line Sunni organization in Basra, the influential Association of Muslim Scholars, said the nine people killed had come to the mosque to protect it.
Parliament was postponed Sunday after al-Maliki again failed to find agreement on who should run Iraq's security forces. The Shiite prime minister had promised to present candidates for the defense and interior posts, as well as minister of state for national security, on Sunday for approval by the 275-member parliament.
The political parties decided "to give the prime minister another chance to have more negotiations," said Deputy Parliament Speaker Khalid al-Atiya, a Shiite.
In Washington, U.S. Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice expressed confidence that Iraqi leaders would agree on candidates in the next few days.
"Of course, they need to get this settled, but they will get it settled. I really do believe that they'll get it settled in the next few days. But the important thing here is that they get it right," she told Fox News on Sunday.
The Interior Ministry will go to a Shiite, the Defense to a Sunni Arab, in an effort to provide balance on security matters. Much of the problems focused on Shiite objections to some Sunni Arab candidates for the defense ministry because they served in the military under ousted President Saddam Hussein.
"The names which were presented for the Defense Ministry were all rejected because some of them are famous military officers during the Saddam era," said Haider al-Ebadi, a Shiite legislator and senior official from al-Maliki's Dawa party.
There also was dissent in Shiite ranks over the interior ministry.
Iraqi security forces were searching Baghdad for four Russian diplomats kidnapped Saturday. Another Russian diplomat was killed in the attack that took place near the embassy in west Baghdad's Mansour district. U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad condemned the attack and promised to help seek the release of the hostages.
The U.S. military said an American soldier was killed Saturday in the volatile Anbar province.
In other violence Sunday, according to police:
-Gunmen in a car opened fire on a minibus carrying telecommunications workers to an area near the Shiite slum of Sadr City, killing four and wounding two.
-Police found 16 bullet-riddled bodies in Baghdad and four in the city of Tikrit, north of the capital.
-Gunmen in Tikrit killed three police officers and wounded two others at a checkpoint.
-Gunmen broke into the home of an Iraqi army soldier, killing him, his two brothers and father and wounding his mother.
-Two gunmen on a motorcycle killed Muntaha Ali and her husband Helmi Yaseen in Basra, believed to be employees of a U.S. government agency.

Iraq hostage sacrificed for Blair's political ends, family says
· Margaret Hassan's siblings say offer of talks spurned
· Accused on trial today but victim's body still missing
Jon di Paolo - Monday June 5, 2006 - The Guardian
The family of an aid worker murdered in Iraq have accused the British government of in effect sentencing her to death by refusing to speak to her kidnappers.
The group holding Margaret Hassan made several calls from her mobile phone to her Iraqi husband, Tahseen, demanding to speak to the British embassy, her brother and sisters said. A statement issued on their behalf said Mr Hassan had been told by British officials that they would not speak to the hostage takers.
Less than a month after the abduction in October 2004, the Dublin-born charity worker, who held an Iraqi passport and had lived in the country for 30 years, was killed. Her body has never been found.
"We believe that the refusal by the British government to open a dialogue with the kidnappers cost our sister her life," said the statement, released yesterday by Deidre, Geraldine, Kathryn and Michael Fitzsimons. "Margaret, who was vocally opposed to the war in Iraq, was sacrificed for the political ends of Tony Blair and George Bush."
Three men arrested by American troops in May last year and charged in connection with the killing are to go on trial in Baghdad today. The family said they had begged the former foreign secretary Jack Straw, his successor, Margaret Beckett, and the Foreign Office to arrange for the suspects to be interviewed by British military police officers.
"They have refused this request even though this is the only way that Margaret's remains will be found and we can bring her home to be buried with the dignity she deserves," they said. "We believe the time has now come for the British and Irish people to know the truth of what happened to our sister Margaret, a British subject."
The Foreign Office confirmed Mrs Hassan's husband had been called from her phone by someone claiming to be behind her abduction, but said it had been unable to confirm the claims. It said that during the kidnap, "our strategy was one of 'personalisation and localisation', minimising the links between Mrs Hassan and the UK. We understand her family having criticisms of the government approach and we remain in regular contact with them."
One of the recordings, which showed Mrs Hassan in tears begging for British troops to be withdrawn from Iraq, was screened on the al-Jazeera Arabic TV channel. At the time, Mr Straw described it as "extremely distressing" and said: "We hope all Iraqis will join us in calling for her immediate release."
The Foreign Office said it would follow the trial of the three men very closely.

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 4
*NEAR BAQUBA - A U.S. artillery round landed in a small Iraqi town and police reported afterwards that two civilians were killed in a blast and one woman later died from her wounds, the U.S. military said. Three other people were also reported wounded and six houses were damaged in the town of Hibhib, north of Baghdad, after a U.S. artillery unit fired a 155 mm round during training on Friday, it said in a statement.
*SAMAWA - One policeman and two protesters were wounded in a clash that erupted when about 500 demonstrators gathered outside a provincial government building to demand better services and an end to corruption, witnesses and police said. A curfew was later declared in the town 270 km (168 miles) south of Baghdad.
*FALLUJA - A U.S. soldier died as a result of enemy action in the western Anbar province, the U.S. military said.
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi army soldiers detained 19 suspected "terrorists" in a search operation in eastern Baghdad on Saturday, the U.S. military said on Sunday.
BAQUBA - Gunmen shot dead two civilians standing outside a grocery story in the town of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - Roadside bomb exploded outside a local army headquarters, wounding two military personnel, police said.
BAGHDAD - Police found 15 bodies in different parts of Baghdad, police said.
NEAR UDHAIM - Gunmen dragged 24 civilians out of their cars at a makeshift checkpoint near the town of Udhaim, 120 km (80 miles) north of Baghdad, on Sunday and shot them dead, a senior police official said.
KIRKUK - A civilian was killed when a roadside bomb exploded in the town of Dibis, 40 km (25 miles) northwest of the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said.
LATIFIYA - Gunmen stormed a school and abducted the headteacher, a teacher and a guard in Latifiya, 40 km south of Baghdad, police said.
KIRKUK - One policeman was killed and two wounded when a roadside bomb struck their patrol in southern Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed four people working for a state-run communications company and wounded two others in Baghdad on Sunday, police sources said.
BASRA - A Sunni religious group in the southern Iraqi city of Basra said on Sunday police killed 12 unarmed worshippers in a Sunni mosque, but police said they returned fire.
A police source said they had received a tip-off that "terrorists" had taken refuge inside al-Arab mosque and were fired on when they surrounded it on Saturday night. They said nine gunmen were killed and six arrested.
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENT:
BAGHDAD - A parliament session in which new defence and interior ministers were expected to be chosen has been postponed "until further notice", the deputy speaker said. Khaled al-Attiya did not give reasons for the postponement but government sources said the powerful Shi'ite Alliance is deadlocked on a nominee for the Interior Ministry post.
BAGHDAD - An Iraqi Interior Ministry official denied a state television report that four Russian embassy employees kidnapped in Baghdad had been released. "They are still abducted," the official told Reuters, declining to be named.
A Russian embassy employee in Baghdad was killed on Saturday and four other embassy staff were kidnapped when gunmen blocked their vehicle in the capital's western Mansour district. - alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 5
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - Gunmen shot dead Ghalib Ali Abdulla, the head of the local municipal council in Baghdad's western district of Mansour, and his driver, medical sources said.
*NEAR BALAD - One wanted al Qaeda militant, Hasayn Ali Muzabir, was killed and another was detained near Balad, 90 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, during a raid on June 2, the U.S. military said in a statement.
*SUWAYRA - Four bodies with stab wounds were found in the Tigris River near Suwayra, 45 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad.
BAQUBA - Gunmen shot dead the bodyguard of a local official and the bodyguard's father and brother in the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Iraqi army forces raided four targets in central Baghdad and killed a financier bankrolling insurgent activities, the U.S. military said.
BAGHDAD - Iraqi forces captured two al Qaeda militants responsible for attacks in Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
MOSUL - The Iraqi army arrested 22 suspects in Mosul 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, the Defence Ministry said.
BASRA - The Iraqi army arrested four men and confiscated weapons in the city of Basra, 550 km (340 miles) south of Baghdad, the Defence Ministry said.
NEAR FALLUJA - Police found the body of a man who had been shot and tortured near the town of Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHAD - Iraqi forces killed one "terrorist" and detained three others in a raid in Baghdad on Sunday, the government said.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - A Baghdad court sentenced an Iraqi man to life in jail in connection with the 2004 abduction and killing of Iraqi -British aid worker Margaret Hassan. A court official said that Mustafa Salman had been charged with aiding and abetting the kidnappers. Two other defendants in the case were freed.
BAGHDAD - The trial of Saddam Hussein and seven co-accused for crimes against humanity resumed in Baghdad, with more defence witnesses taking the stand. - alertnet

US administration can be behind recent attack against Russian diplomats in Baghdad
05.06.2006 Source: Pravda
The Russian embassy in Iraq has no information about the fate and whereabouts of the Russian citizens captured in Baghdad. The embassy cooperates with local authorities, coalition forces and political parties in Iraq, but it has not been possible to collect any information about the hostages yet. The embassy is working with Iraqi security forces and other departments to find and release the Russian citizens.
Four Russian diplomats have been kidnapped in Baghdad on Saturday; another officer of the Russian embassy has been killed. Experts believe that the assault has been meticulously planned. A group of Russian diplomats were traveling in a Chevrolet Suburban vehicle. They stopped the car only 400 meters far from the embassy to buy some groceries. A group of armed assaulters blocked the vehicle on the road and opened automatic fire. The next minute the attackers seized four passengers of the Chevrolet vehicle - all of them Russian embassy employees - pushed them into the minibus and took the hostages in an unknown direction. Security guard Vitaly Titov was seriously wounded during the attack, although the kidnappers left him on the scene. Titov was alive when other employees of the Russian embassy rushed to help their colleagues. The man died on the way to the hospital.
Several news agencies reported on Saturday night that the Russian hostages had been freed as a result of a special operation conducted by US and Iraqi troops. The Internal Affairs Ministry of Iraq rejected the information later.
None of the Iraqi terrorist groups have claimed responsibility for the attack against Russian citizens yet. Special services believe that the terrorists kidnapped the Russian diplomats with a view to hold them to ransom. The majority of hostage-taking incidents in Iraq have occurred because of the financial reason so far. Over 200 foreigners and 1,000 Iraqi people have been kidnapped in the war-torn country after the collapse of Saddam Hussein's regime. However, the kidnappers have not released any statements yet, although they usually ask for money during 24 hours after the crime. Furthermore, Iraqi kidnappers prefer to attack European nationals or those coming from wealthy countries of the Persian Gulf. Russia does not fit in these two categories. That is why, special services believe, the kidnappers could have other motives for their attack.
Some specialists believe that the attack against Russian diplomats in Baghdad could be good for Washington. The US administration is particularly concerned about the Moscow-run politics in Iraq (which contradicts to Washington's goals) and the activities of Russian special services in Iraq. To crown it all, the Bush's administration dislikes the image of 'a friend of Iraq' which Russia propagandizes.
Former Iraqi Ambassador to Russia Abbas Halaf stated that the attack against the Russian diplomats had been instigated by US troops in Iraq. The official believes that the USA tries to punish Russia for its political activities in the region, especially in Iraq. It is worthy of note that US soldiers attacked a column of Russian diplomats and wounded five of them in April of 2003.

Despite video, U.S. troops cleared in March deaths
By Hamza Hendawi and Kim Gamel Baghdad, Iraq | - wilmingtonstar.com
A military investigation into allegations that U.S. troops intentionally killed Iraqi civilians in a March raid in a village north of Baghdad has cleared the troops of misconduct, two defense officials said Friday, despite dramatic video footage of slain children.
The investigation of the March 15 attack in the village of Ishaqi concluded that the U.S. troops followed normal procedures in raising the level of force as they came under attack while approaching a building where they believed an al-Qaida terrorist was hiding, two defense officials said.
The probe was part of U.S. investigations into possible misconduct by American troops in at least three separate areas.
Two investigations are examining reports of American troops killing two dozen unarmed civilians in Haditha on Nov. 19 as a revenge attack shortly after one of their own died in a roadside bombing. Also, seven Marines and a Navy corpsman could face murder, kidnapping and conspiracy charges in the April shooting death of an Iraqi man west of Baghdad.
The military said Friday it will cooperate with the Iraqi government in its own investigation of Haditha and other incidents of alleged wrongdoing by U.S. troops.
Meanwhile, a lawyer representing families of Iraqi civilians allegedly killed by U.S. Marines in Haditha said three or four Marines carried out the shooting while 20 more waited outside.
The lawyer, Khaled Salem Rsayef, said Marines ordered four brothers inside a closet and shot them dead.
Rsayef said he witnessed U.S. troops responding to the bomb attack from his house. He said he lost several relatives in the alleged massacre, including a sister and her husband, an aunt, an uncle and several cousins. He and his brother, Salam Salem Rsayef, spoke to The Associated Press from the Euphrates River town of 90,000 late Thursday and Friday.
Despite the Iraqi government's insistence of cooperation between the U.S. and Iraqi investigations, the Rsayefs said they and other victims' families turned down a request by U.S. military investigators several months ago to exhume the victims' bodies for forensic tests.
"No way we can ever agree to that," Salam Salem Rsayef said. Under Islamic teachings, exhuming bodies is prohibited.
Other developments in Iraq:
Zarqawi tape: The leader of al-Qaida in Iraq railed against Shiites in a four-hour audiotape posted on the Internet on Friday, saying militias are raping women and killing Sunnis and the community must fight back.
The tape by Abu Musab al-Zarqawi appeared aimed at sabotaging the Iraqi government's efforts to name a unity government - but was also intended to enflame rising Shiite-Sunni tensions across the Arab world.
Security priority: Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki said Friday he will work hard to restore security to his strife-torn country.
His vow came as twin bombings at a Baghdad pet market where dogs, birds and other animals are sold killed at least five people and wounded 57.

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 6
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
* BASRA - Gunmen shot dead five people who came to collect the body of a victim killed earlier in the day, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb that exploded near a tent where a funeral reception was being held killed five people and wounded 12 others in southwestern Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - An Iraqi army division has taken over from U.S. forces in patrolling an area in Anbar province, the U.S. military said, the first transfer on that level in the western heartland of the Sunni Arab insurgency. The 1st Iraqi Army Division officially assumed control of territory near the town of Habbaniya on June 2, it said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen shot dead Thoaban Abdul Kathim, head of the local council of Baghdad's western Al-Jihad district, along with an aide and a driver while they were heading to their office, medical sources said.
BAGHDAD - A man and his wife were gunned down in the western Furat district, medical sources said.
BAQUBA - Police found nine severed heads in the al-Hadid district in the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Two civilian were killed and seven others were wounded when two mortars hit a market in central Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Three mortars landed near a hospital in central Baghdad, police sources said, adding there were no immediate reports of any casualties.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed one woman in Baghdad. Two people, including a teenage girl, were later killed when police who had sealed off the area opened fire when their car failed to stop despite warnings, witnesses said.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said he would release 2,500 prisoners with no clear evidence against them or who were mistakenly detained, in a move to help reach "national reconciliation".
BAGHDAD - Maliki said no nominees for the posts of interior and defence ministers were presented to parliament on Sunday as scheduled because there was not a sufficient number of assembly members present for a vote. The two crucial security posts have been vacant since his government was sworn in on May 20.
* ROME - Prime Minister Romano Prodi resisted calls by leftist allies to speed up the withdrawal of troops from Iraq after an Italian soldier was killed near the southern city of Nassiriya.
* LONDON - Three British soldiers were cleared by a military court of manslaughter in the death of an Iraqi youth who drowned in a canal. The soldiers, who arrested Ahmed Karheem as a suspected looter in Basra in May 2003, had been accused of forcing him to swim in a canal to punish him. Karheem could not swim and died, prosecutors said. - alertnet.org

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 7
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
* BAGHDAD - Two policemen were killed and three were wounded when a roadside bomb hit a patrol in western Mansour district. A car bomb later went off as firefighters rushed to the scene, injuring one firefighter.
MOSUL - Gunmen shot dead three university students in Mosul 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
MOSUL - Three people, including a policeman, were killed in a drive-by shooting in Mosul, police said.
BAQUBA - Two Iraqi soldiers were killed and four were wounded in the town of Baquba, 65 km north of Baghdad, police said. One of them died when a roadside bomb struck his patrol. Gunmen later opened fire on Iraqi troops evacuating the wounded, killing the second soldier.
BAQUBA - Gunmen stormed two neighbouring shops and killed their two owners in Baquba, police said.
BAGHDAD - Thirteen of about 50 Iraqi transport workers abducted earlier this week were found alive but some showed signs of torture and had been shot in the foot, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - One U.S. soldier was killed when a roadside bomb struck his convoy in Baghdad on June 5, the U.S. military said on Wednesday.
BAGHDAD - Two police officers were killed and two policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb struck their vehicle in eastern Baghdad, police sources said, naming the dead as Colonel Hussain Ali and his aide Major Sami Hassan.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen in a car shot dead four policemen and wounded another in an attack on their patrol in Baghdad on Wednesday, police sources said.
HAWIJA - Gunmen killed a Sunni mosque preacher in the town of Hawija, 60 km southwest of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk late on Tuesday, police said.
BAGHDAD - Police found five bodies, two of them women, in different parts of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A mortar round landed on a house, killing a man and wounding his son in eastern Baghdad, police said.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - Italian Foreign Minister Massimo D'Alema said during a visit to Baghdad that he believed Italian troops would return home from Iraq by the end of this year.
BAGHDAD - Nearly 600 prisoners were released a day after new Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said a total of 2,500 would be freed to help foster national reconciliation. More than 100 of them were freed in the capital, a Reuters reporter said. - alertnet.org

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 8
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
NEAR BAQUBA - U.S. warplanes killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the al Qaeda leader in Iraq blamed for bombings, beheadings and assassinations, in a strike near the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed 13 people and wounded 28 others in a crowded Baghdad market, police sources said. The explosion occurred in the eastern New Baghdad district.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb exploded in a Baghdad street, killing seven people and wounding 17 others, police said. The blast hit the northwestern Shi'ite district of Kadhimiya.
BAGHDAD - Another car bomb in Baghdad killed six people and wounded 13 others in the east of the capital, police said.
BAGHDAD - A third car bomb hit Baghdad's northern Shaab district, killing four people and wounding eight, said police sources.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - The Iraqi parliament approved Maliki's candidates for interior and defence ministers, ending wrangling that had threatened to plunge his government into crisis.
New Interior Minister Jawad al-Bolani, a Shi'ite, and Defence Minister General Abdel Qader Jassim, a Sunni who until now served as Iraqi ground forces commander, pledged to improve security for all people in strife-torn Iraq. - alertnet.org

dead again ...

Riddle of how Zarqawi died
Terrorist had been trying to set up global network: experts
Dexter Filkins in Hibhib and John Burns in Baghdad - June 12, 2006 - smh.com.au
IN THE ruins of the Hibhib house where Abu Musab al-Zarqawi spent his final moments, it was mostly questions that remained.
Chief among them was how Zarqawi, the terrorist leader killed on Wednesday in a US air strike, could have survived for even a few minutes after the attack, as US officers say he did, when everything else around him was obliterated.
At a briefing in Baghdad, the US command's chief spokesman, Major-General William Caldwell, said on Saturday air force experts had assured him it was possible.
It seemed puzzling, too, given the destruction and the condition of the other five bodies, that Zarqawi's head and upper body - shown on televisions across the world - could have remained largely intact.
Officials said Zarqawi had suffered no gunshot wounds, trying to dispel suggestions that someone had delivered a coup de grace at the scene. They said that two military pathologists had performed an autopsy on the terrorist leader and they were awaiting the findings.
It was initially said that Zarqawi was killed outright by the bombs. On Friday, General Caldwell said the terrorist lived long enough to be put on a stretcher, and died soon after of his wounds.
Ahmed Mohammed, a local resident who said he rushed to the scene shortly after the bombs struck on Wednesday night, said that he and others helped pull a man he now believes was Zarqawi from the rubble.
When US forces arrived, they took the man aside, Mr Mohammed said, and kept asking him his name. When he did not respond, the soldiers kicked him and hit him until his nose bled.
The account provided by Mr Mohammed, who said he and others at the scene were interrogated for several hours by US forces, could not be independently confirmed. It also conflicts with reports that Iraqi police were the first to reach the site.
At the Baghdad briefing, General Caldwell reversed an earlier announcement that one of the dead was a small girl, aged five or six. He said three of the victims were men, including Zarqawi, and two were women.
General Caldwell said the changing details were a result of the confusion typical in the immediate aftermath of military operations. "There is no intention on anybody's behalf to engage in deception, manipulation or evasion," he said.
Days after the raid, new details continued to emerge.
General Caldwell said the Americans knew for certain that Zarqawi was in the house only when his spiritual adviser, Sheik Abd al-Rahman, arrived.
The US Air Force F-16 fighter jet that dropped both bombs was one of two aircraft on a "routine mission" in the area, with no planning for the bombing, when they were ordered to carry out the attack immediately. One of the jets was refuelling from an aerial tanker, so the mission fell "to a single bird", he said.

dead again ...

Al-Zarqawi death prompts attack warning
By LEE KEATH, Associated Press Writer CAIRO, Egypt - news.yahoo.com
Al-Qaida in Iraq vowed Sunday to carry out "major attacks," insisting in a Web statement that it was still powerful after the death of leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The statement did not name a successor to al-Zarqawi, who was killed by a U.S. airstrike Wednesday. But it said the group's leadership "renews its allegiance" to Osama bin Laden.
Bin Laden "will see things that will bring joy to his heart," it said, vowing "to prepare major attacks that will shake the enemy like an earthquake and rattle them out of sleep."
The authenticity of the statement could not be independently confirmed. It was posted on an Islamic militant Web forum where the group has posted statements in the past.
Gen. George Casey, the top U.S. commander in Iraq, told "Fox News Sunday" he expected the statement from al-Qaida in Iraq because "they're hurt badly." He said there had been a "steady drumbeat" of operations against al-Zarqawi's network since the leader's hideout was bombed.
"It's expected but I think we'll be prepared for it," Casey said of the threat. "But again, you can't stop terrorist attacks completely."
The statement was issued in the name of al-Qaida in Iraq but was put out by the Mujahedeen Shura Council, an umbrella organization of five insurgent groups that al-Zarqawi helped create.
The statement said al-Qaida in Iraq's leadership met after al-Zarqawi's death and "agreed to continue jihad (holy war) and not be affected by his martyrdom."
"The organization has strengthened its back, regained its footing and has been renewed with fresh blood," it said, listing previous prominent members who had been killed without setting back the group's attacks.
"For those who were waging holy war for the sake of al-Zarqawi, al-Zarqawi is dead. But for those who were fighting for the sake of God, God is alive and eternal," it said.
The phrase echoed the words used by the Prophet Muhammad's successor, Abu Bakr, after the prophet's death in the 7th century to urge Muslims to stick to their new faith.
The message left unknown the issue of who will succeed al-Zarqawi as the group's "emir," or leader.
Thursday's al-Qaida statement was signed by al-Zarqawi's deputy emir, Abu Abdul-Rahman al-Iraqi, and sympathizers quickly flooded Web forums with vows of allegiance to him.
But Sunday's message did not mention his name. There is confusion over whether he is still alive, after the U.S. military said a man named "Abdul-Rahman," whom it identified as al-Zarqawi's spiritual adviser, died in the airstrike alongside his leader.
The U.S. military has said the mostly likely successor is an Egyptian associate of al-Zarqawi named Abu Ayyub al-Masri, who has a $50,000 reward on his head.

Women clothing among debris of bombed Zarqawi house
10 Jun 2006 07:31:38 GMT By Michael Georgy HIBHIB, Iraq, June 10 (Reuters) - Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was accompanied by women who wore skimpy night clothing, and read magazines on current affairs and militant propaganda, an inspection of the house he was killed in showed on Saturday.
The remains of Zarqawi's isolated "safe house" also suggested that the al Qaeda leader in Iraq and his companions -- which an Iraqi army officer said included two women and an eight-year-old girl -- lived with few luxuries.
The U.S. military took reporters to the site in the village of Hibhib, near the town of Baquba north of Baghdad, three days after the death of Zarqawi, blamed for beheading hostages and killings hundreds of people in suicide bombings.
At the site surrounded by palm groves, two thin foam mattresses were scattered among the debris of smashed concrete and twisted metal.
There were few clues on Zarqawi's extreme ideology or the militant groups he was linked to in the rubble of the building that was pulverised by two 500-pound (227-kg) bombs in a U.S. air strike on Wednesday.
One leaflet identified a radio station in Latifiya south of the capital as an apparent target. A few feet away was a magazine picture of former U.S. President Franklin D. Roosevelt.
Also beside the slabs of concrete was a woman's leopard skin nightgown and other skimpy women's clothes.
The U.S. military had said the air strike killed a total of six people, three males and three females.
It said on Friday that a wounded Zarqawi was still alive when U.S. troops reached the site but died shortly afterwards.
Looking over the site where Iraq's most wanted man may have been plotting more suicide bombs, an Iraqi soldier said he felt a great sense of relief.
"I feel good. Zarqawi is dead. Thank you America," said Adel Hussein, 33, a resident of the area.
U.S. officers at the scene said they had been alerted to an operation but were not told that Zarqawi was the target of the air strike until the next morning.
Hibhib, about 70 km (43 miles) north of Baghdad, is typical of the rural Iraqi villages where U.S. troops hunt Sunni Arab insurgents and al Qaeda militants.
It is located in Diyala province, a volatile mix of majority Shi'ites and Arab Sunnis and Kurds that has suffered some of the grisliest violence. Zarqawi is said to have moved to Diyala as part of a strategy of constantly moving around Iraq to evade U.S. and Iraqi forces.
U.S. President George W. Bush said on Friday that the death of the Jordanian-born Sunni Arab militant will not end the violence in Iraq but will "help a lot." - alertnet.org

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 9
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
*KUT - Police pulled the bodies of seven people with gunshot wounds to their heads and bearing signs of torture from a river in a rural area near Kut, 170 km (105 miles) southeast of Baghdad.
*KUT - A roadside bomb wounded three Iraqi army soldiers near the city of Kut, 170 km (105 miles) southeast of Baghdad.
*BAGHDAD - Authorities enforced a daytime traffic ban in Baghdad amid fears of al Qaeda reprisals after the killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. A night time traffic ban is being enforced until further notice in the volatile town of Baquba.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen kidnapped Muthana al-Budairi, a senior official of Iraq's oil ministry in Baghdad, after he left work on Thursday, police and oil ministry sources said on Friday.
MOSUL - Gunmen shot dead Zuhair Muhammad Kashmola, brother of the governor of Mosul province, in the city of Mosul 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said.
RAMADI - Gunmen attacked two civilian trucks carrying construction materials for the U.S. base in Ramadi and abducted the drivers, said police Lieutenant Rahman Al-Dulaimi in the town 100 km (60 miles) west of Baghdad. The trucks were destroyed in the attack.
FALLUJA - Gunmen shot dead a civilian in central Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad, police and witnesses said. - alertnet.org

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 10
June 10 (Reuters) - The following are security and other developments in Iraq on Saturday as of 0800 GMT.
The new Shi'ite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has vowed to rein in insurgent and sectarian violence that has killed thousands of people since U.S. forces invaded Iraq in 2003.
BAGHDAD - Three civilians were killed and 28 wounded when a roadside bomb exploded in a crowded market in central Baghdad, police sources said, adding the bomb was aimed at a police patrol.
KHAN BANI SAAD - Police found the severed heads of two Sunni Arab brothers in the small town of Khan Bani Saad near Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said. They had been kidnapped from their workplace in Baquba a week ago.
KIRKUK - Gunmen ambushed and wounded three civilians in a car 25 km (15 miles) northeast of the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said.
HAWIJA - A civilian in a car was killed when a roadside bomb exploded in the town of Hawija about 60 km (40 miles) southwest of Kirkuk on Friday evening, police said.
KIRKUK - Two civilians were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near a U.S. patrol in central Kirkuk 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad on Friday, police said.
KIRKUK - One policeman was wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near his patrol in central Kirkuk on Friday night, police said. - alertnet.org

British Troops, Insurgents Battle in Iraq
By RYAN LENZ , 06.11.2006,
Insurgents set a fire in a vegetable market to lure British soldiers into a gunbattle Sunday that left five civilians dead and more than a dozen hurt by the crossfire, Iraqi police said.
The fighting was part of a string of violent incidents Sunday amid a government stalemate and threats of continued violence from insurgents after the death of al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Police Capt. Hussein Karim said insurgents started the blaze in the market in south Amarah, 180 miles southeast of Baghdad, to draw the troops into an ambush.
The British Defense Ministry offered a different account, saying soldiers were sent to search the suspected launch site of a rocket attack and came under small-arms fire.
The ministry said there were reports of "a small number of terrorist casualties," but full details of the incident remained unclear. It could not confirm that civilians were among the dead and wounded.
Meanwhile, Iraq's national security adviser said he believed the number of coalition forces would drop below 100,000 by year's end. Mouwafak al-Rubaie also said the majority of coalition forces would leave before mid-2008.
"The more our Iraqi security forces, our police, our army, the more they grow in number, in training and are ready and able to perform and to protect our people, then the less we need of the multinational forces," al-Rubaie told CNN's "Late Edition."
"The overwhelming majority of the multinational forces will leave probably before ... the middle of 2008."
The top U.S. commander in Iraq said Sunday he does not plan to ask President Bush for more troops during meetings this week, but he declined to say whether he would suggest a reduction of his forces.
"I constantly evaluate the situation," Gen. George Casey said. "And if I think I need more, I'll ask more. If I think I need less, I'll tell the president that I need less."
White House officials have played down expectations of troop cutback announcements coming from the president's summit on Iraq.
Roadside bombs struck two Iraqi police patrols in separate attacks in north and south Baghdad, killing two people, at least one of them a police officer, and wounding 11.
At least nine other violent deaths were reported around the country.
Al-Qaida in Iraq vowed Sunday to carry out "major attacks," insisting in a Web statement that it was still powerful after the death of al-Zarqawi. Insurgents Saturday posted an Internet video of the beheading of three alleged Shiite death squad members.
The attacks since the Thursday announcement of al-Zarqawi's death have been far from the mass bloodshed promised by his supporters. The government had imposed partial driving bans in Baghdad and Baqouba, which resulted in a slight drop in violence. An average of about 19 people a day were killed around Iraq in the past three days.
Continuing an already monthlong delay, the Iraqi parliament postponed its session to allow the main political blocs more time to agree on the exact powers of the Sunni Arab parliament speaker.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki met with party representatives Saturday but failed to break the deadlock.
Fellow Sunni insurgent groups sent condolences for al-Zarqawi in Internet messages Saturday and warned Sunnis not to cooperate with the Iraqi government, an apparent call for unity after U.S. forces killed the terror leader in a targeted airstrike Wednesday.
The Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi was the defining face of Iraq's insurgency. His tirades against the nation's majority Shiites and calls for the once-dominant minority Sunni Arabs to rise up and kill them were accompanied by the killings of thousands of Shiites in attacks.
Iraqi and U.S. leaders acknowledged that al-Zarqawi's killing was not likely to stop the insurgency, now in its fourth year. But they hoped it would rob his supporters of an iconic figure around which they rallied.
Saturday's grisly video was the first known footage of insurgent beheadings posted in months and was clearly designed to quash hopes that the Sunni-dominated insurgency might end attacks on Shiites.
In other violence Sunday:
_ Drive-by gunmen fired on a civilian car, killing the driver, police said.
_ Police in the southern Baghdad neighborhood of Dora found four unidentified bodies, all of which had been tortured and shot.
_ Baghdad police said they separately found the body of a Health Ministry security guard who appeared to have been shot in the head after being tortured and the corpse of a taxi driver who was reported kidnapped yesterday in Dora.
_ Unidentified gunmen in Mosul shot and killed a former Iraqi Army officer, police said. The assailants were in a speeding car and killed Ali Ahmed Abdullah with a machine gun as he was walking in one of the city's commercial centers.
_ A roadside bomb in western Mosul killed one bystander and injured six others, police Col. Abdul-Karim Ahmed said.
Associated Press reporters Sinan Salaheddin and Qais al-Bashir contributed to this report. - forbes.com

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 11
The new Shi'ite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has vowed to rein in insurgent and sectarian violence that has killed thousands of people since U.S. forces invaded Iraq in 2003.
* BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed six people and wounded 42 others in Baghdad's central Karrada district, police said.
BAGHDAD - More than 150 Iraqi prisoners were released under a national reconciliation plan announced by Maliki last week to free a total of 2,500 inmates.
RAWA - Insurgents killed four Iraqi soldiers after they attacked an Iraqi desert army base in Anbar province, police said.
DUBAI - Al Qaeda in Iraq vowed to carry out large-scale attacks that would "shake the enemy" after the killing of its leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, but did not name a successor.
TIKRIT - Police found the beheaded body of an Iraqi soldier in a river near Tikrit 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
TIKRIT - Gunmen wounded two civilians when they opened fire on their car in central Tikrit, police said.
KIRKUK - A joint Iraqi police and U.S. forces patrol raided a house in central Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, on Wednesday and arrested seven suspected insurgents, police Brigadier Sarhat Qadir said on Sunday.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb seriously wounded a senior police officer, Major General Ali Hussain, in northern Baghdad, police said. A policeman who was driving Hussain's car was killed and another was wounded in the attack.
FALLUJA - Gunmen killed a man and a woman in a car in Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, police and hospital sources said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead a security employee of the Kurdish PUK party and another person in central Kirkuk on Saturday, police said on Sunday.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead a civilian and wounded another in a car in central Kirkuk on Saturday, police said.
AMARA - A multinational force soldier was wounded in Amara, 365 km (225 miles) southeast of Baghdad, when British forces left their base and moved into the city to respond to indirect fire, said a British military spokesman.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol exploded near the southern Baghdad district of Dora, wounding five civilians, police said.
POLITICAL DEVELOPMENTS
WASHINGTON - The commander of U.S. troops in Iraq predicted in an interview with CBS "Face the Nation" on Sunday a gradual reduction of the 131,000 U.S. forces in the country if the new Iraqi unity government held together and the Iraqi army improved.
WASHINGTON - A sergeant who led a squad of U.S. Marines accused of killing 24 Iraqi civilians at Haditha told his lawyer the unit did not intentionally target civilians, followed rules of engagement and did not try to cover up the incident, the Washington Post reported. - alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 12
* BAGHDAD - A car bomb ripped through a market in Baghdad's Shi'ite Sadr City district, killing five people and wounding 19, police said.
* DIWANIYA - A U.S. soldier was killed by a roadside bomb near the town of Diwaniya, 180 km (112 miles) south of Baghdad, on June 9, the U.S. military said on Monday.
* BALAD - Two car bombs exploded near a market in Balad, killing at least five people and wounding 26, police and hospital sources in the town north of Baghdad said.
BAGHDAD - Al Qaeda in Iraq named Sheikh Abu Hamza al- Muhajira successor to Abu Musab al-Zarqawi and said he would pursue the gruesome campaign of suicide bombings and beheadings begun by the Jordanian militant killed last week.
BAGHDAD - Zarqawi lived for almost an hour after the first U.S. bomb struck his hideout north of Baghdad last Wednesday, a U.S. military spokesman said.
SUWAYRA - Police found nine bodies, including a 10-year-old boy, in a river near Suwayra, about 45 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad. The victims, shot in the head and chest, showed signs of torture. One severed head was also found, police said.
AL HASHEMIYA - U.S. forces killed seven militants with links to senior al Qaeda leaders in a raid near the area where Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed last week, the U.S. military said. It said there were several women and children at the scene and that two children had also been killed.
BAGHDAD - Three mortar rounds smashed into a Baghdad neighbourhood, killing four people and wounding 10, police said. No more details were immediately available about the attack in Dora, a mostly Sunni district.
TIKRIT - Gunmen shot dead a policeman north of Tikrit, 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, a joint U.S. and Iraqi police centre said.
BAIJI - Police found the body of an unidentified person who was shot dead in the refinery city of Baiji, 180 km (112 miles) north of Baghdad, a joint U.S and Iraqi police centre said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb targeting a bus carrying industry ministry workers killed six people and wounded 12 others in Baghdad, police sources said.
KIRKUK - A civilian was killed and another two were injured when a roadside bomb exploded in Kirkuk 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead two civilians on the road from Kirkuk to Tikrit, north of Baghdad, police sources said.
POLITICAL OR OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - Guards at Saddam Hussein's trial forced his co- accused half-brother Barzan Ibrahim al-Tikriti out of the Baghdad courtroom after an argument with the chief judge.
BAGHDAD - Iraq is considering inviting certain members of insurgent groups to national reconciliation talks, a source in the prime minister's office said. - alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 13
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
* BAGHDAD - More than 40,000 Iraqi and U.S. forces will launch a security crackdown in Baghdad on Wednesday, a senior Ministry of Defence official said. "The number of the combined forces participating in the security plan will be more than 40,000," Major General Abdel Aziz Mohammed told Reuters.
BAGHDAD - Four mortars slammed into Baghdad's southern Dora district, killing 2 people and wounding 11, police sources said.
KIRKUK - A roadside bomb killed 10 civilians and wounded 11 others in the city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said. It exploded when people gathered at the scene of a car bomb that seriously wounded senior police officer Taha Salhiddin and killed one of his bodyguards.
KIRKUK - A roadside bomb exploded outside a law college, killing one civilian and injuring 2, police sources said.
KIRKUK - A suicide car bomber blew himself up outside Kirkuk police headquarters, killing two policemen and wounding 10 civilians, police sources said.
KIRKUK - A suicide bomber attacked an office of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) in Kirkuk, wounding 4 office guards, police sources said.
KIRKUK - A suicide bomber attacked another PUK office in Kirkuk, wounding 2 civilians. Another suicide bomber later tried to blow himself up at the same place but was shot dead by guards, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - One suspected militant was killed and 23 others were detained during coordinated raids north of Ramadi on Monday, the U.S. military said on Tuesday.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen shot dead Baghdad University Professor Muthana Harith Jassim, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Police found 6 bodies, showing signs of torture, in different parts of Baghdad, police sources said.
KUT - A policeman was killed and 2 wounded when their patrol was attacked in the city of Kut 170 km (105 miles) southeast of Baghdad.
KERBALA - Gunmen shot dead a police captain and wounded 2 of his bodyguards in the city of Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad, police sources said.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
* BAGHDAD - U.S. President George W. Bush made a surprise visit to Iraq and met new Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki. The White House said he would be on the ground for more than five hours and would also meet U.S. troops. The visit comes six days after a U.S. air strike killed Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al Qaeda in Iraq.
BAGHDAD - The chief judge in Saddam Hussein's trial on crimes against humanity said Tuesday would be the last day to hear defence witnesses, setting the stage for final arguments before the court reaches a verdict. alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 14
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
* BASRA - A crowd accusing an Iranian satellite station of insulting an Iraqi cleric attacked Iran's consulate in the southern city of Basra, setting fire to an annex of the compound, Reuters television footage showed.
* KIRKUK - Police killed a suicide bomber when he tried to detonate his car near a police checkpoint 15 km (8 miles) southwest of the northern city of Kirkuk, police said.
* NAJAF - Gunmen killed a construction contractor near his house in Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad on Tuesday evening, police said. The man, working for the Iraqi government as well as for U.S.-led forces in Iraq, was the brother of a member of Najaf's provincial council.
BAGHDAD - Iraqi troops set up extra checkpoints and a tank patrolled a violent area in Baghdad, but there were few signs of a major crackdown to root out militants after a U.S. air strike killed al Qaeda's leader last week.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb killed two civilians and wounded seven in northern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb exploded near a police patrol in northern Baghdad, wounding one civilian, police said.
BAGHDAD - Clashes erupted between gunmen and security forces, a Reuters reporter said, after Iraqi troops stepped up security in the capital. The shooting took place in the northern Adhamiya district, a Sunni insurgent stronghold. There were no immediate reports of any casualties.
POLITICAL AND OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
* BAGHDAD - Iraq's Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki reiterated he was ready to open talks with some insurgent groups, even as a security crackdown got under way in Baghdad. alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 15
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - A car bomb in front of a bakery killed at least three people in Baghdad on Thursday, a police source said. No further information was immediately available about the blast in the southwestern Saydiya district, a religiously mixed part of the capital.
BAQUBA - Gunmen shot dead at least 10 labourers as they were heading to work in the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, a police source said.
BAQUBA - A woman and her son were severely injured when a bomb exploded in a graveyard in the town of Qara Taba, north of Baquba. Police defused two other bombs planted in the same cemetery, Sirwan Shokor, director of the Qara Taba council, said.
TAL AFAR - Three roadside bombs targeting Iraqi army patrols killed five soldiers and injured other six in the town of Tal Afar, about 420 km (260 miles) northwest of Baghdad.
TIKRIT - Four worshippers were killed and 20 others were injured when gunmen attacked a mosque in the small town of Alam east of Tikrit, 175 km (110 miles) north of Bghdad, police sources said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead an Iraqi soldier in the city of Haweeja near the city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAQUBA - Gunmen shot dead police Colonel Ali Shakir Mahmoud, director of units protecting oil installations in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad.
BAGHDAD - Security forces have seized al Qaeda in Iraq documents giving key information about the militant group's network and the whereabouts of its leaders, the country's national security adviser said. "We believe this is the beginning of the end of al Qaeda in Iraq," Mowaffaq al-Rubaie told a televised news conference.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - The U.S. military said it believes the real name of al Qaeda in Iraq's new leader is Egyptian Abu Ayyub al-Masri and that he will replicate the bloody tactics of his slain predecessor. alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 16
SECURITY DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - Mortar rounds slammed into a neighbourhood on the northern outskirts of Baghdad, killing at least three people and wounding 16, police said.
BASRA - Gunmen killed the local head of a Sunni religious group in the Iraqi Shi'ite city of Basra, the group and state television said. The gunmen shot dead Yusif al-Hassan near the mosque where he led prayers in Basra, 550 km (340 miles) south of Baghdad, colleagues said.
BAGHDAD - A suicide bomber killed at least 10 people and wounded another 25 inside a Shi'ite mosque in Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - The U.S. military said army criminal investigators were probing the deaths last month of three men in the custody of U.S.-led forces in Iraq.
* BAGHDAD - One coalition soldier was killed and two others were listed as missing after their team came under attack at a checkpoint southwest of Yusifiyah, the U.S. military said. alertnet.org/

Series of Explosions Kill 7 in Baghdad
By SINAN SALAHEDDIN Associated Press Writer - BAGHDAD, Iraq (Assoc Press) Jun 17, 6:17 AM EDT--
A series of explosions struck commercial areas in Baghdad on Saturday, killing at least seven people, a day after a suspected shoe bomber blew himself up inside one of Baghdad's most prominent Shiite mosques, killing 13 people.
The four blasts, all within two hours, dealt a new blow to a huge security operation by the Iraqi government to secure the capital.
Elsewhere, a suicide car bomber exploded his vehicle as it was being towed near a police checkpoint, killing four civilians, said Capt. Rashid al-Samarie. He said the bomber claimed his car had broken down and hired a tractor to tow it while he rode inside.
The attack happened in the mainly Sunni city of Mahmoudiya, 20 miles south of Baghdad, which was also hit by a mortar barrage that killed one civilian and wounded three others, all from the same family, al-Samarie said.
A soldier in the U.S.-led coalition also was killed Friday and two others were missing after an attack on a checkpoint near the town of Youssifiyah, 12 miles south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
The first attack in the capital occurred shortly before 10 a.m.. when a mortar shell was fired at one of Baghdad's oldest markets in the predominantly Shiite suburb of Kazimiyah, Capt. Mohammed al-Waili said. He said at least four people were killed and 13 wounded.
About a half hour later, a bomb left in a plastic bag struck an outdoor market for secondhand goods, killing two civilians and wounding 24, some seriously, police Lt. Ahmed Mohamed Ali said.
A roadside bomb also missed a police patrol about 10:40 a.m. in Karradah, a popular shopping area in downtown Baghdad, killing one civilian and wounding two, police Col. Abbas Mohammed said.
About 20 minutes later, a parked car bomb targeted an Iraqi army patrol near the Wathiq Square in the same neighborhood, killing one soldier and wounding 10 people, including two civilians, police Lt. Ali Mitab said.
The surge in violence has shattered a fragile calm imposed by the security crackdown launched Wednesday in the capital.
On Friday, a suspected shoe bomber targeting a Shiite imam who criticized Abu Musab al-Zarqawi blew himself up inside the Buratha mosque during the main weekly religious service, killing 13 people and wounding 28. That attack was carried out despite a four-hour driving ban intended to prevent suicide car bombs during Friday prayers.
The mosque's imam, a leading Shiite politician, blamed al-Qaida in Iraq. He said the terror group was trying to reassert itself after the death of its leader in a U.S. airstrike last week.
"Al-Qaida is trying to restore some respect after the killing of the terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi by targeting one of the leading Shiite clerics, but they will fail," said the imam, Jalal Eddin al-Sagheer.
The imam, who was not injured, said the bombing came after guards found two pairs of shoes containing explosives outside the mosque. The guards entered the mosque and began searching everyone who had carried their shoes inside, he said.
When they approached the attacker, he detonated what would have been a third pair of explosives-laden shoes, he said.
But the Interior Ministry, noting the scale of destruction, suggested the attacker may have detonated a vest rather than shoes. Police Lt. Thaer Mahmoud said the attacker was indeed wearing a suicide vest.
The device contained metal balls and fragments, according to an Interior Ministry police officer who could not be named because he was not authorized to speak to reporters. Metal balls and fragments could fit into either shoes or a vest.
It was the second attack on the Buratha mosque in just over two months. On April 7, four suicide bombers, including a woman, set off their explosives during Friday prayers, killing at least 85 worshippers. The U.S. military blamed al-Zarqawi.
Al-Sagheer said the terror group had threatened to kill him in an Internet posting this week. A similar warning preceded the April attack, he said.
He said al-Qaida accused him in the latest posting of being behind deaths squads targeting Palestinians living in Baghdad. For years, a large contingent of Palestinians, who are Sunni Arabs, has lived in Baghdad.
On Friday, Al-Jazeera aired an audio tape of a key insurgency leader calling al-Zarqawi's death a "great loss" but saying it will strengthen the militants' determination.
The broadcaster identified the voice as that of Abu Abdullah Rashid al-Baghdadi, the head of the Mujahedeen Shura Council, which groups five Iraqi insurgent organizations including al-Qaida in Iraq. The authenticity of the tape could not immediately be verified.
Significantly, the speaker does not mention the man identified by the U.S. as al-Qaida in Iraq's choice to replace al-Zarqawi - Abu Ayub al-Masri, also known as Abu Hamza al-Muhajer. The lack of such a reference may suggest that al-Baghdadi does not support him.
There has been a slight decrease in the number of Iraqis reported killed since al-Zarqawi died June 7. In the nine days before the airstrike, 307 Iraqis were killed compared with 262 in the nine subsequent days, according to an Associated Press tally.
In other violence Saturday, according to police:
- Gunmen attacked the house of Iraqi army Col. Makki Mindil, killing him after engaging his guards in a gunfight. Four guards also were wounded in the attack in Amarah, 180 miles southeast of Baghdad. The bullet-riddled body of another Iraqi soldier was found elsewhere in the city.
- Police also found two bodies, handcuffed and shot in the head, in separate areas of eastern Baghdad.

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 17
* BAGHDAD - A bomb on a minibus killed four people and wounded 14 in eastern Baghdad, a police source said.
* BAGHDAD - A car bomb targeting a police patrol wounded four people, including three police commandos, in eastern Baghdad, police said.
MAHMUDIYA - A car bomb targeting an Iraqi army checkpoint killed seven people and wounded 15 in Mahmudiya, 30 km (20 miles) south of the capital, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb targeting Iraqi army and police forces in Baghdad killed 11 people, including an Iraqi soldier, and wounded 15, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Mortar rounds slammed into a crowded market in the northern Shi'ite Kadhimiya district of Baghdad, killing two people and wounding another 14, police said.
BAGHDAD - A bomb exploded in a crowded market in central Baghdad, killing six people and wounding 11, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb exploded near Iraq's National Theatre in central Baghdad, killing one person and wounding five, police said.
YUSUFIYA - U.S. forces were searching for two U.S. soldiers who went missing after an attack on Friday in which one American soldier was killed in the Sunni insurgent stronghold of Yusufiya in the "Triangle of Death" south of Baghdad.
DAGHARA - Gunmen killed the deputy chief of the municipal council of the small town of Daghara and his two sons, about 180 km (112 miles) south of Baghdad, police said. The killing of Rasim Moussa took place near his house on Friday night.
MAHAWEEL - Gunmen in a car shot dead a civilian near his house on Friday in the town of Mahaweel, 75 km (45 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
* WASHINGTON - The military has loosened the conditions under which it is confining seven Marines and a Navy corpsman as it investigates the fatal shooting of an Iraqi civilian in April, the U.S. Marine Corps said on Friday. alertnet.org/

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 18
* KIRKUK - Attackers hurled a grenade at a shop selling alcohol and seriously wounded three people in the oil city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
* NAJAF - Gunmen on Saturday evening ambushed and killed a policeman near his house in Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
* BAQUBA - Gunmen in a car shot dead three persons including two Iranians in Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen abducted 10 workers at a bakery in northwestern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Six people were wounded in a mortar attack in northern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Ten bodies were found overnight in different parts of the capital, police said.
FALLUJA - A woman was seriously wounded when gunmen opened fire on a police vehicle taking her to hospital in the town of Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.
alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 19
The new Shi'ite-led government of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has vowed to rein in insurgent and sectarian violence that has killed tens of thousands of people since U.S. forces invaded Iraq in 2003.
*BAGHDAD - The Mujahideen Shura Council, a group linked to Iraq's al Qaeda said it had abducted two U.S. soldiers south of Baghdad who went missing on Friday after an attack on a checkpoint, according to an Internet statement.
*BAGHDAD - The group also said it was holding four Russian "diplomats" hostage in Iraq and gave Moscow 48 hours to pull out from Chechnya and free Muslim prisoners. On June 3, a Russian embassy employee was shot dead in Baghdad and four others were abducted.
*BAGHDAD - A car bomb targeting a police checkpoint in southern Baghdad killed three people and wounded three.
*RAMADI - Helicopters flew over the Iraqi town of Ramadi and warplanes could be heard overhead as U.S. troops hunted down insurgents in the rebel stronghold, a Reuters witness said.
NAJAF - One person was killed and five wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near the Shi'ite city of Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber killed four civilians and wounded 10 when he detonated his vehicle near an Iraqi army checkpoint in central Baghdad, police said.
KERBALA - Gunmen killed a senior police officer and wounded two of his bodyguards in the holy Shi'ite city of Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - Prosecutors demanded the death penalty for Saddam Hussein, his half-brother Barzan al-Tikriti, former vice-president Taha Yassin Ramadan and former Revolutionary Court judge Awad Hamed al-Bander for crimes against humanity stemming from the 1982 killing of Shi'ite villagers in Dujail.
BAGHDAD - Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Iraqi forces would take charge of security in the southern province of Muthanna next month, where the British oversee a multinational contingent including Japanese and Australian troops. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 20 20 Jun 2006 16:25:27 GMT
*BAGHDAD - A car bomb exploded in central Baghdad, killing at least five people and wounding 11, police said.
YUSUFIYA - The U.S. military said it had found two bodies believed to be those of two U.S. soldiers missing since a clash near Yusufiya, south of Baghdad, on Friday.
HILLA - Police found two bodies, blindfolded and the hands tied, in the town of Iskandariya south of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Two people were killed and 28 wounded by a roadside bomb near a market in central Baghdad, police said. The target of the explosion was not clear.
BAGHDAD - Seven people were killed and 18 wounded when a car bomb exploded in a crowded market in eastern Baghdad, police said. Five people were wounded in a similar explosion in southern Baghdad.
BAGHDAD - The bodies of five people, handcuffed with gunshot wounds in the head, were found in different districts of the capital, police said.
NEAR HAWIJA - Gunmen opened fire on a car near Hawija, 70 km (40 miles) southwest of Kirkuk, killing three members of the same family, police said.
BASRA - A suicide bomber killed a woman and wounded five people when he attacked a crowd of pensioners in the southern city of Basra, 550 km (340 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
FALLUJA - Gunmen killed Hudhairi Abbas, the deputy police chief of Falluja, 50 km (35 miles) west of Baghdad, police said. Monday's shooting prompted U.S. and Iraqi forces to impose a dawn-to-dusk vehicle curfew in Falluja on Tuesday.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed an officer of the protection force of al-Yarmouk hospital in southern Baghdad, police said.
SUWAYRA - Iraqi police retrieved the bodies of seven people from the Tigris river on Monday in Suwayra, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said. The bodies were handcuffed, blindfolded and bearing signs of torture, police added. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 21
*BAGHDAD - Dozens of Iraqi factory workers were abducted by gunmen as they were being ferried home after work in a fleet of buses just north of Baghdad, police and Interior Ministry sources said.
BAGHDAD - Australian security guards protecting a trade delegation shot dead a bodyguard of Iraq's trade minister and wounded three others in Baghdad after mistaking them for insurgents, witnesses and police said.
BAGHDAD - An Iraqi patrol stormed a building in Baghdad's Mansour district, detaining 20 people, after a sniper opened fire on the soldiers, killing one, a witness said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen kidnapped and killed Khamis al-Obaidi, one of Saddam Hussein's chief defence lawyers, and then dumped his bullet-riddled body in a Baghdad street, police said.
BAGHDAD - Two people were killed and six wounded when a car bomb exploded in a crowded market in the Shi'ite district of Sadr city in eastern Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Iraqi and U.S. forces captured Noori Abu Hayder al-Oqabi, described as a high-level insurgent responsible for many kidnappings and killings, during a raid in Baghdad's Shula district, the U.S. military said.
TIKRIT - Gunmen kidnapped three relatives of the deputy governor of Salaheddin province, Qasim al-Barazanchi, on Tuesday, police said.
NEAR TIKRIT - U.S. forces arrested 12 people on Tuesday near Tikrit, the U.S./Iraqi Joint Coordination Centre said, without giving further details.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed the imam of a Sunni mosque on Monday in his house in Shula district, the Association of Muslim Scholars said in a statement. Gunmen also killed a high school teacher in the same neighbourhood, the association added.
BASRA - The deputy chief of the Sunni Endowment religious organisation in Basra was wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near his car on Tuesday, the association said. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 22
*BASRA - Nine Iraqi civilians were wounded by mortar bombs landing near a petrol station on a busy street in the southern city of Basra, a British military spokesman said. The mortars appeared to have been aimed at official buildings but missed.
BAGHDAD - Saddam Hussein has gone on a hunger strike to protest against the killing of one of his main lawyers, the U.S. military said, and his defence said it was considering boycotting the trial.
*BAQUBA - The governor of Diyala province was wounded and his driver and a bodyguard killed when a bomb exploded near his convoy in Baquba, 60 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad, police sources said. They dismissed a U.S. military statement that there was no bomb, only a tyre blow-out that caused an accident.
BAGHDAD - A bomb attached to a motorcycle exploded in the Alawwi area in central Baghdad, killing two civilians and injuring eight others, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - Fourteen bodies of workers in an electricity plant were found in the city morgue on Tuesday. They were abducted and killed on June 12, the Association of Muslim Scholars said in a statement. There was no immediate confirmation from the police.
NAJAF - Gunmen riding a motorcycle shot dead a police officer in Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, police sources said.
ANBAR PROVINCE - Four U.S. soldiers were killed on Tuesday in two separate attacks in Iraq's western Anbar province, the U.S. military said.
DHULUIYA - Gunmen killed an Iraqi soldier in his home in Dhuluiya, 40 km (25 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier was killed by a roadside bomb south of Baghdad on Wednesday, the U.S. military said.
HAWIJA - Gunmen killed a carpenter on Wednesday in Hawija, 70 km (43 miles) southwest of Kirkuk, police said.
KIRKUK - Iraqi soldiers killed a gunman and arrested two on Wednesday after coming under attack in the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 23
*BASRA - A car bomb exploded near a petrol station in Basra, 550 km (340 miles) south of Baghdad. Officials disputed the death toll. Hospital sources said at least five bodies were brought in. Police said 10 were killed and 15 wounded. The governor, embroiled in a bitter dispute with the police chief, insisted only two people were killed. Political leaders in other southern cities have played down such tolls in recent weeks.
BAGHDAD - Two U.S. soldiers were killed on Friday when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb southeast of Baghdad, the U.S. army said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - Police recovered five bodies from the Tigris River near Baghdad's Kadimya area. They identified them as some of the factory workers abducted two days earlier.
KIRKUK - The sister of the former speaker of the Iraqi parliament, Hajim Al-Hassani, was wounded when gunmen attacked her near her home, police sources said.
BAQUBA - A roadside bomb targeting an army checkpoint in the village of Bohriz wounded three civilians. Police said the soldiers then opened fire, wounding 11 civilians, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - A U.S. Marine died "due to enemy action" while conducting operations in Al Anbar Province on Thursday, the U.S. military said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - At least three policemen and five soldiers were wounded in clashes with gunmen in central Baghdad, Interior Ministry sources said. Witnesses said the fighting was also between Shi'ite militiamen loyal to radical cleric Moqtada al-Sadr and U.S. troops.
BAQUBA - Ten people were killed and 15 wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near a mosque in the village of Hibhib near Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
HILLA - Two policemen were killed when gunmen ambushed their patrol in Latifya south of Baghdad, police sources said.
BAGHDAD - The U.S. military said it had captured a senior al Qaeda in Iraq member near an area where the group's leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was killed in a U.S. air strike two weeks ago.
FALLUJA - A U.S. Marine was killed on Wednesday "due to enemy action" in western Anbar province, the U.S. military said on Friday.
BAGHDAD - U.S.-led forces killed four foreign militants, one of them wearing a 15-pound suicide belt, during a raid on Friday north of the insurgent stronghold of Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - U.S.-led forces detained nine suspected militants near the town of Yusufiya who are believed to be responsible for planting roadside bombs, the U.S. military said.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - The government shortened a curfew banning all movement by cars and people in the capital, lifting it just three hours after it was declared. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 24 24 Jun 2006 15:20:38 GMT
*NAJAF - Gunmen opened fire on a car in Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, killing two employees of a U.S. military base, police said.
DHULUYIA - A suicide car bomb exploded in Dhuluyia, 90 km (55 miles) north of Baghdad, killing five members of an Iraqi security patrol, a policeman at the scene said.
KIRKUK - A roadside bomb killed the local intelligence chief, Mousa Hachim, and two of his guards in northern Iraq's ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, the city's police chief Torhan Abdul-Rahman said.
UDHAIM - Gunmen killed three Iraqi soldiers and wounded five when they fired at their minibus near the town of Udhaim, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - Gunmen killed three people near a car showroom in the violent eastern Iraqi town of Baquba, police said.
SUWAYRA - The headless body of a young woman was found in the River Tigris near the town of Suwayra on Friday, police said.
BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier was killed in a bomb blast while on patrol south of Baghdad on Saturday, the U.S. military said. Earlier, it reported that a U.S. soldier was killed in a roadside bombing in the centre of the capital on Friday.
MAHAWEEL - A Shi'ite tribal sheikh was kidnapped along with his son in the mixed Shi'ite-Sunni town of Mahaweel, 90 km south of Baghdad, police said. Sheikh Jasim al-Hindi, who heads the small Gureyat tribe, was abducted late on Friday.
*TIKRIT - U.S. forces hunting al Qaeda insurgents raided the home of a senior Sunni Arab religious leader in Iraq, seizing him and four suspected terrorists, the U.S. military said. The Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party said those arrested included the sheikh, his two sons and a fellow religious leader and demanded their release.
BAQUBA - One woman and two children were wounded when five shops belonging to Shi'ites were bombed in the Sunni insurgent stronghold of Baquba, police said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb wounded two civilians when it exploded near a passing U.S. military convoy in the western Baghdad district in Khadhra, police said.
alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 25
*DUBAI - An Iraqi al Qaeda-led group said it had killed four Russian embassy staff it was holding hostage, according to a statement posted on the Internet.
*NEAR MOSUL - Two people were killed and 13 wounded when a car bomb exploded close to an office of the Supreme Council of Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) near the northern city of Mosul, the biggest political party in government, police said.
HAWIJA - Gunmen shot dead two Shi'ite workers in a poultry store in this predominantly Sunni town 60 km (37 miles) south of Kirkuk. Shortly afterwards, a Shi'ite man was shot dead in the street by gunmen in a vehicle, police said, adding that there was a possible link between the two shootings. A tortured, decapitated body was also found dumped by the roadside in Hawija on Sunday.
BAQUBA - Gunmen shot dead police General Hussein Abdul-Rahman, a lieutenant-colonel and a third officer in their car in a market in the town of Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - Gunmen attacked a checkpoint in Khan Bani Sa'ad, south of Baquba, and killed five Iraqi soldiers, police said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen abducted 16 employees of a government technology institute north of Baghdad as they travelled to their work place from the capital, police said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed three people and wounded 17 in the wholesale shopping district of al-Shorja in Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - The U.S. military charged a soldier with voluntary manslaughter for shooting an unarmed Iraqi man near a U.S. base in Ramadi in February. He was also charged with obstructing justice, along with a second soldier.
MOSUL - Gunmen killed a carpenter in Mosul, police said.
BAGHDAD - A bomb inside a minibus exploded, killing two people and wounding five in al-Nahdha district, police said.
BAGHDAD - A suicide car bomber killed a police commando and wounded nine people in an attack on a police checkpoint in Baghdad's eastern Zayouna district, police said.
TIKRIT - A U.S. soldier was killed on Saturday when a roadside bomb exploded near his convoy south of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
BAIJI - A municipal council employee was shot dead by gunmen on his way to work in the oil refinery city of Baiji, 180 km (112 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S./Iraqi Joint Coordination Centre said.
TIKRIT - An Iraqi soldier was killed when a roadside bomb exploded near an army patrol in Tikrit, 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, the Joint Coordination Centre said.
BAGHDAD - U.S. forces killed an insurgent and detained five during a raid in southern Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
RAMADI - U.S. forces detained 11 insurgents and discovered two weapon caches during a raid east of Ramadi, 110 km (68 miles) west of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.
YUSUFIYA - U.S. forces killed two insurgents and detained another on Saturday during a raid north of Yusufiya, 15 km (nine miles) south of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 26
*HILLA - A bomb left in a bag exploded at a market in Hilla, 100 km (62 miles) south of Baghdad. Interior Ministry sources in Baghdad, citing Hilla police, said 17 people had been killed and 25 wounded. But a spokesman for Hilla police, Captain Muthana al-Mamoury, said only eight were dead and 58 wounded.
*KHAIRNABAT - A bomb strapped to a parked motorcycle killed seven people at a crowded market in the mainly Shi'ite village of Khairnabat, near Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, witnesses and Interior Ministry sources said. Twenty five people were wounded.
*BAGHDAD - The U.S. military said two American soldiers found dead south of Baghdad last week were kidnapped and killed. Privates First Class Kristian Menchaca and Thomas Tucker were part of a three-man team guarding a canal crossing in Yusufiya.
*BAGHDAD - A U.S. Marine died from wounds sustained in combat in the western Anbar province, the military said.
BAGHDAD - A suicide bomber killed two police commandos and wounded four at a checkpoint in al-Saidiya district, police and Interior Ministry sources said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen shot dead a security guard for top Sunni politician Adnan al-Dulaimi, while he was standing near an intersection in western Baghdad, Dulaimi told Reuters.
BAGHDAD - One civilian was killed and five wounded when a roadside bomb targeting a police patrol exploded on a road in eastern Baghdad, police said.
SUWAYRA - Police killed five insurgents on Sunday in the small town of Suwayra, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
KUT - Gunmen killed a policeman on Sunday in Kut, 170 km (105 miles) southeast of Baghdad, police said.
MOSUL - Gunmen killed a police officer on Sunday in Mosul, police said.
MOSUL - A policeman was killed and six people wounded -- four police and two insurgents -- in clashes in Mosul, police said.
BAQUBA - A bomb outside a shop killed a policeman and wounded five people. Police had gone to recover the body of a Shi'ite man killed by gunmen in the religiously mixed city of Baquba, police said.
MOSUL - A policeman and a civilian were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near a police patrol in the northern city of Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said. Iraqi soldiers killed three gunmen in a separate incident. Gunmen killed a Kurdish man in the city on Sunday, police added.
NEAR FALLUJA - The body of a policeman was found with bullet wounds in his head and chest near Falluja, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.
ISKANDARIYA - Gunmen shot dead two undercover policemen and their driver in their car in Iskandariya 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 27
*BAGHDAD - A car bomb in a market in Baghdad's southern district of Doura killed three people and wounded 10, police source said.
*BAGHDAD - Hundreds of prisoners were released from Abu Ghraib prison under a "national reconciliation" plan by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki that aims at freeing a total of 2,500 inmates this month. All were held without formal charges.
KIRKUK - At least three people were killed and 21 wounded when a car bomb exploded in a petrol station in the Iraqi city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - Three policemen were killed and three others wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol in southeastern Baghdad, a Ministry of Interior source said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen killed an off duty soldier while he was driving his car in Kirkuk, police said.
NAJAF - A local general inspector for the Ministry of Interior was wounded with his bodyguard on Monday when gunmen opened fire at his car in the Shi'ite city of Najaf, 160 km (100 miles) south of Baghdad, police said. The driver was killed.
ANBAR PROVINCE - A U.S. Marine died from wounds sustained in a military operation in Anbar Province, the U.S. military said.
BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier died from wounds sustained in a bombing during a dismounted patrol south of Baghdad, the military said.
KHAIRNABAT - The death toll from a bomb strapped to a parked motorcycle in the Shi'ite village of Khairnabat, near Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad, climbed to 18, police said. The blast, which occurred at a crowded market on Monday, also wounded 25 people.
NEAR KIRKUK - An Iraqi army officer and two soldiers were wounded when a roadside bomb went off beside their patrol near the oil rich city of Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, army said.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
*BAGHDAD - Saddam Hussein and his former top army commanders will go on trial on Aug. 21 on charges of killing tens of thousands of Iraq's Kurds during a military campaign in 1988, Chief prosecutor Jaafar al-Moussawi said. alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 28
BAGHDAD - A bomb at a market in the Shi'ite Kadhimiya district of Baghdad killed one person and wounded eight, sources at the Ministry of Interior said.
FALLUJA - Gunmen killed two policemen on Tuesday in the rebellious city of Falluja, 50 km (35 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.
BAGHDAD - The Iraqi army killed three insurgents and arrested 12 others on Tuesday in the cities of Baghdad, Kirkuk, Mosul and Ramadi, it said on Wednesday.
BAQUBA - A bomb seriously wounded two policemen who had rushed to a Shi'ite mosque after another bomb had exploded without causing casualties in the same mosque in the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of the capital, police said.
BAGHDAD - National Security Adviser Mowaffaq al-Rubaie said the Iraqi army had wounded and arrested a Tunisian wanted for the February bombing of a Shi'ite shrine that sparked a wave of sectarian killings. He said an al Qaeda cell led by an Iraqi and including four Saudis was behind the Golden Mosque blast.
BAGHDAD - Rubaie said an al Qaeda militant from Tunisia had confessed to taking part in the killing of al Arabiya correspondent Atwar Bahjat. Bahjat disappeared with her cameraman Khaled Al Falahi and soundman Adnan Khairallah as she reported the February bombing of a Shi'ite shrine in Samarra.
BAGHDAD - The U.S. military, in the spotlight over murder charges against its troops accused of killing Iraqis, said it had killed a "non-combatant" during a raid in which an al Qaeda militant was detained near Baquba, north of Baghdad.
*ANBAR PROVINCE - A U.S. soldier died from wounds sustained due to enemy action while operating in Anbar Province on Tuesday, the U.S. military said on Wednesday.
*NORTH OF BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier was killed by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad on Tuesday, the U.S. military said.
MAHAWEEL - A policeman was killed and three wounded on Tuesday night when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in Mahaweel, 75 km (50 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - A car bomb exploded near a crowd of labourers gathered to look for work killing three labourers and wounding 12, including children and old men, police and hospital sources said.
OTHER DEVELOPMENTS
BAGHDAD - Iraq's prime minister said that armed groups had contacted him on peace efforts but he stressed that those with blood on their hands would be excluded from any amnesty under his reconciliation drive. (Baghdad newsroom; editing by Steve Pagani)) alertnet

FACTBOX-Developments in Iraq on June 29
*KIRKUK - A suicide car bomber rammed into a funeral service for a Shi'ite soldier and killed seven people in the Iraqi northern city of Kirkuk on Thursday, police said.
KHAIRNABAT - A sniper shot dead the police commander of a local quick reaction force, and two of his companions in the village of Khairnabat, north of Baghdad, police said.
KERBALA - Gunmen shot a criminal intelligence policeman in central Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad, police said.
SUWAYRA - The bodies of seven men were found in the Tigris River south of Baghdad, police said. All had gunshot wounds and showed signs of torture.
FALLUJA - An Iraqi army checkpoint in Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, came under mortar fire that killed two soldiers and wounded one, police said. When the soldiers returned fire, one civilian was killed and two wounded.
RIYADH - A roadside bomb targeting an Iraqi army patrol exploded in Riyadh, a town 60 km (40 miles) southwest of Kirkuk, killing a soldier and wounding seven, police said.
MUSSAYAB - The bodies of two men with gunshot wounds and showing signs of torture were found in the Euphrates River in the town of Mussayab, about 60 km (40 miles) south of Baghdad, a police source said.
MAHAWEEL - The body of an unidentified man was found on a road in the town of Mahaweel, 75 km (50 miles) south of Baghdad, police said. alertnet