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Politics : American Presidential Politics and foreign affairs -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Dierks who wrote (12009)	9/18/2006 9:37:04 AM
From: E. T.	Respond to of 71588

When will Iraq be liberated? AMERICA IN IRAQ Iraq death squads reap 22 more BAGHDAD TOLL MOUNTS DESPITE COALITION EFFORT By Solomon Moore Los Angeles Times BAGHDAD, Iraq - Death squads continued to sweep through the Iraqi capital Thursday, leaving behind a grisly trail of at least 22 bodies, some of them handcuffed and decapitated. At least 19 people were killed in other violence throughout the country, including five U.S. soldiers whose deaths were reported Thursday. A U.S. military spokesman acknowledged that despite a major operation to combat death squads and curb sectarian violence between Shiite militia fighters and Sunni Arab insurgents in Baghdad, violence has increased. ``There was a spike in violence that did occur in the city over the last 24 hours,'' Maj. Gen. William Caldwell told reporters. ``And a large portion of those, and the reports we received thus far, are from murder execution-style-type activity.'' The grim body count came one day after the discovery of 60 slaying victims in Baghdad's streets. Caldwell, however, said areas such as the troubled Dora district in south Baghdad have seen dramatic gains in security. ``If you go down to the Dora area . . . where they've focused the operations and continue to operate today, you can walk very freely through that area,'' Caldwell said. Nearly half of the corpses found in Baghdad on Thursday had been dumped on Dora's outskirts. All of those bodies still wore handcuffs, and bore torture marks and bullet holes where they had been shot, point-blank, Iraqi police Capt. Mohammed Hanoon said. In other violence, a suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden truck near an electrical substation on Baghdad's western outskirts, killing two U.S. soldiers. Although the truck blew up outside thick concrete blast walls, the concussive force of the explosion and shrapnel injured 25 other soldiers, U.S. Army press liaison Lt. Col. Barry Johnson said. It wasn't immediately clear why the soldiers were at the substation, or whether the bombing had any effect on electrical power in Baghdad. The military reported that two other soldiers died in the capital Thursday; one was shot to death in southeast Baghdad, and another was killed by a roadside bomb. And a U.S. soldier in the northern city of Mosul was shot Wednesday and died after reaching a military hospital, according to a military statement. Also Thursday, a car bomb in southeast Baghdad killed nine people, including two Iraqi police officers, and injured 29 other people. Interior Ministry officials also reported that two worshipers were killed when gunmen attacked a mosque with AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenades. In the northern city of Tal Afar, 70 miles west of Mosul, a man detonated a bomb vest near a checkpoint, killing one man and injuring three other people. In the northern oil hub of Kirkuk, gunmen assassinated a tribal sheik and local councilman named Abdullah Khalaf Azzawi and his son as they drove home. The U.S. military also announced a flurry of anti-insurgent activity in western Al-Anbar province, used as a haven for many Al-Qaida fighters in Iraq. Caldwell said U.S. and Iraqi forces have killed 66 suspected insurgents and arrested 830 others this month. Witnesses said U.S. Marines raided a funeral 20 miles west of the violent town of Ar-Ramadi, where Sunni Arab insurgents and U.S. troops have battled for months. After the burial ceremony, U.S. forces arrested at least 60 men at the gathering. Caldwell also announced that U.S. and Iraqi troops conducted 25 raids in and around Baghdad, capturing 70 suspected insurgents, including an associate of Al-Qaida in Iraq leader Abu Ayyub al-Masri. San Jose Mercury News, USA