Four US soldiers are killed; Iraqi general gunned down
BAGHDAD -- Four US soldiers were killed yesterday north of Baghdad, and gunmen assassinated an Iraqi general and two companions in a Shi'ite neighborhood of the capital.
Three US soldiers died after their vehicle rolled into a canal yesterday, the military said. The men from Task Force Danger were on a combat patrol near the town of Balad, 50 miles north of Baghdad, the US command said in a statement.
A fourth Task Force Danger soldier was killed and one was wounded in fighting near Samarra, a flash point of the insurgency 60 miles north of Baghdad, the military said.
In the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah, an Iraqi translator for Italian troops and the man's son were shot to death yesterday, a spokesman for the Italian military said.
Hassan Khiwaet Ghali, 51, and his son, Salah, 20, were killed near their home, said Lieutenant Colonel Francesco Tirino, a spokesman for the Italian contingent in Nasiriyah. The elder Ghali had worked for the Italian contingent since the summer of 2003.
In violence in the north, insurgents attacked a US convoy and a government building near Mosul, leaving at least four people dead, hospital workers said. Two Iraqi National Guardsmen also were killed while trying to defuse a bomb along Mosul's airport road.
US hopes for a larger NATO role in Iraq suffered a setback yesterday when Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer of Germany rejected calls for the alliance to protect UN operations there. Secretary General Kofi Annan also ruled out a UN security role.
In the Baghdad assassination, the gunmen struck as Brigadier General Jadaan Farhan and his companions were traveling through the Kazimiyah district, an Iraqi police officer said on condition of anonymity.
A claim of responsibility for the attack in the name of Al Qaeda quickly surfaced on a website that often posts statements by Islamic militants. The claim described the brigadier general as a senior commander in the Iraqi National Guard and the guard commander at Taji camp, a US facility about 15 miles north of Baghdad.
There was no way to verify the claim's authenticity.
In the battle north of Mosul, insurgents fired on the convoy in Qahira district, leaving at least four people dead and two wounded, doctors at Jumhuri Teaching Hospital said. Insurgents also fired a rocket at the governor's building in Mosul, killing a woman and a man and injuring four other people, hospital officials said.
The NATO role in Iraq has been limited to a small training mission in Baghdad and logistics support to a Polish-led force serving with the US coalition. Iraq war opponents, led by France and Germany, have prevented the alliance from developing a wider role and have refused to send their own troops, even on the training mission.
Fischer said his country would not veto a NATO decision to do more if it was backed by the other 25 allies. But he insisted, ''we will not be sending soldiers to Iraq."
Germany's government strongly opposed the US-led invasion.
Fischer emphasized German efforts to help Iraq in other ways, including military and police training outside the country, economic aid, and debt relief.
