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Blast in Baghdad Kills One; Troops Arrest Over 100
Tue December 30, 2003 11:19 AM ET
By Raju Gopalakrishnan BAGHDAD (Reuters) -
Guerrillas set off a roadside bomb in a crowded Baghdad shopping district on Tuesday as U.S. military vehicles drove past, killing one Iraqi civilian and wounding several others.
The attack came as U.S.-led forces launched raids across the country to mop up insurgents. Military spokesman Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt said more than 100 suspected guerrillas had been taken into custody since Monday.
The bombing in the bustling Karada district of central Baghdad, was the second attack on U.S. troops in the area in three days. Two children and a U.S. soldier were killed in a similar blast on Sunday.
"The pavement just blew up everywhere," said Abbas Aboud, a passing motorist who received minor wounds to his face.
The capital has been on tenterhooks because of fears of increased attacks around New Year. The U.S.-led coalition has stepped up patrols and warned troops and staff to be vigilant.
Tuesday's blast occurred as hundreds of people were out on the streets in Karada -- children going to school, workers going to the office and shopkeepers opening up for business.
Witnesses said the bomb, most likely placed on the concrete divider of a main street, was apparently aimed at two U.S. military vehicles passing by. Neither vehicle suffered much damage. One Iraqi was killed on the spot. In the restive town of Baquba, 40 miles north of Baghdad, U.S. troops used explosives to blast open the gate to a cluster of houses where suspected guerrillas were living.
An intelligence officer in Saddam Hussein's former regime and eight suspected Fedayeen guerrillas were arrested in the early morning raid, said Lieutenant-Colonel William Adamson, task force commander for the town.
Kimmitt, the spokesman in Baghdad, said 49 raids were conducted across the country, resulting in 101 arrests.
"AL QAEDA LITERATURE" FOUND
In a search near the town of Samarra in the volatile "Sunni triangle" north of Baghdad, soldiers found a cache of weapons along with "al Qaeda literature and an al Qaeda video," Major Josslyn Aberle of the 4th Infantry Division told reporters.
The weapons haul included bomb-making equipment, one bomb that had already been assembled, 43 grenade launchers and 25 AK-47 assault rifles, she said. U.S. officers say they believe some foreign Muslim militants are co-operating with Iraqi guerrillas to launch attacks. They say some 10 percent of anti-coalition militants are foreigners.
The London-based Asharq al-Awsat daily quoted Iyad Allawi, a member of the U.S.-appointed Iraqi Governing Council, as saying Saddam had given U.S. interrogators information on hidden weapons and as much as $40 billion he may have seized.
In Bangkok, the bodies of two Thai soldiers killed in a weekend attack in Kerbala arrived home by plane. The men were the first Thai soldiers killed in action abroad since the Vietnam war.
Defense Minister Thammarak Isarangura told those gathered for a ceremony at Bangkok's military airport that Thai troops would finish their humanitarian mission despite the deaths. Some opposition politicians have called for Thai troops to be pulled out.
Five Bulgarian soldiers and 12 Iraqis were also killed in the Kerbala attacks, a coordinated series of assaults by suicide car bombers and guerrillas firing mortars and machineguns.
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| Earth, a planet hungry for peace |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers (Ran Cohen, pmc, 5/24/03). |
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| The Israeli apartheid (security) wall around Palestinian population centers in the West Bank, like a Python (Alquds, 1/25/03. |
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