BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) A roadside bomb killed five U.S. Marines
during combat operations in western Iraq, and the bodies of 21
Iraqis were found scattered in separate locations near a town close
to the Syrian border considered an insurgent hotbed, officials and
witnesses said Friday.
The Marines were killed Thursday while conducting combat
operations near the town of Haqlaniyah, 90 miles north of Baghdad,
in volatile Anbar province, the military said in a statement.
A U.S. soldier died Thursday of non-combat injuries near Tuz
Khormato, about 130 miles north of Baghdad, the military said.
At least 1,689 U.S. military members have died since the Iraq
war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
Five other U.S. soldiers were wounded Thursday when a suicide
car bomber attacked their convoy between Beiji and Tikrit, 80 miles
north of Baghdad, but none of the injuries was life-threatening,
the military said.
Separately, seven U.S. soldiers were wounded when a suicide car
bomber attacked their vehicle patrol in the northern city of Mosul
on Friday, spokesman Sgt. John Franzen said.
Meanwhile, the U.S. military said it has launched a criminal
inquiry into the killings of two Army officers at a base in Tikrit.
Capt. Phillip T. Esposito and 1st Lt. Louis E. Allen were killed
Tuesday evening in what the military first believed was an
''indirect fire'' attack on Forward Operating Base Danger, a
military statement said. An indirect fire attack involves enemy
artillery or mortar rounds from a location some distance away.
''Upon further examination of the scene by explosive ordnance
personnel, it was determined the blast pattern was inconsistent
with a mortar attack,'' the statement added without elaborating.
Esposito and Allen were assigned to the 42nd Infantry Division,
New York Army National Guard.
Twelve of the dead Iraqis found in Anbar province had their
hands tied behind their backs and were wearing civilian clothes,
witnesses said. They were found near a small hamlet called Jabab,
about 19 miles east of Qaim, according to witnesses, including an
Associated Press reporter and a crew from Associated Press
Television News.
It was unclear when they were killed.
Another nine bodies were found near Qaim outside the village of
Fosfat, also in civilian clothes and with civilian ID cards.
It was unclear if the bodies had any relation to a group of
about 20 Iraqi soldiers missing from the Qaim area since late
Tuesday.
Qaim, an insurgent hotbed 200 miles west of Baghdad, has been
the scene of many U.S. and Iraqi military operations. U.S. Marines
carried out two major operation in the area last month in which 11
Marines were killed.
Al-Qaida in Iraq, the terror group led by Jordanian-born
Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi, claimed in an Internet posting that it had
abducted 36 Iraqi soldiers in western Iraq on Wednesday. The
posting, on a Web site known to carry militant statements, could
not be independently verified.
''A group of the infidel guards was arrested and investigated
Wednesday,'' it said.
The group added that the men confessed their crimes ''against
Sunnis and their loyalty to crusaders.'' To release them, it gave
the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari a
day to set free ''Muslim women'' held in Iraqi prisons. It did not
elaborate.
Capt. Ahmed Hamid said the soldiers disappeared Tuesday after
leaving an Iraqi army base in two minibuses from Akashat, a remote
village near the Syrian border about 70 miles southwest of Qaim.
Hamid, contacted by telephone at an Iraqi military base in Qaim,
said the soldiers were wearing civilian clothes and traveling to
Baghdad for a vacation.
A car bomb in a working-class district of northwestern Baghdad
killed four men Friday and injured another nine as they sat outside
a takeaway restaurant, police said.
The four were waiting outside the eatery to pick up falafel
sandwiches, a popular Arab staple made with fried chickpeas, police
Lt. Majid Zeki said.
In southern Basra, gunmen killed the dean of the city's police
academy, Col. Karim al-Daraji, police said.
The European Commission, meanwhile, said Friday it plans to have
a delegation in Baghdad within the next few months, re-establishing
a permanent mission for the first time since before the 2003 Iraq
war.
Briefing reporters after returning from the EU's first
high-level visit to Iraq since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein, EU
External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner said the
mission will be small but would grow as the security situation
permits.
''The security situation is difficult, and that's also the
reason why we haven't opened a mission yet,'' she said. ''But we
need a delegation there, with all the possible care given to
security.''
The EU wanted to appoint a charge d'affaires who could engage in
a political dialogue with government authorities, she said. The EU
wants the delegation located in the Green Zone, the security
enclave in the center of Baghdad that also houses the U.S. Embassy.
The EU delegation's one-day visit to Baghdad on Thursday was to
prepare for a major donors' conference in Brussels, Belgium, later
this month.
