Two more US troops killed in Iraq attacks: Governing Council seeks end to ‘conspiracies’
BAGHDAD, Oct 19: Guerrillas killed two American soldiers overnight and blew up a US ammunition truck on Sunday, as Iraq’s US-appointed Governing Council called for an end to “conspiracies” threatening stability.
The latest attacks highlighted what the council called Iraq’s “dangerous security situation” ahead of this week’s conference in Madrid where donors will be asked to contribute to reconstruction costs estimated at $55 billion.
The US military said a patrol came under small arms and rocket-propelled grenade fire late on Saturday near the northern oil city of Kirkuk. Two 4th Infantry Division soldiers were killed and one was wounded.
In Falluja, west of Baghdad, gunmen attacked a US military convoy on Sunday morning, setting a truck carrying ammunition ablaze and sparking off a series of explosions, a Reuters photographer at the scene said.
The gunmen fired on US soldiers caught in the blast and American troops returned fire. The explosions sent flaming shrapnel and plumes of black smoke into the air. Six wounded Iraqis were taken to hospital in Falluja and one later died, hospital officials said.
In Baquba, north of Baghdad, one Iraqi was killed and 19 were wounded when a roadside bomb planted to hit US forces exploded as Iraqi police were evacuating the area, a police officer in the town told Reuters.
And US troops killed three Iraqis who had attacked their convoy in Hawija, south of Kirkuk, the military said.
The military reported 30 attacks on Saturday alone. The guerrillas are most active in a “Sunni triangle” north and west of Baghdad, home to Saddam’s tribal network.
Iraq’s 25-member Governing Council, in a special statement announcing the establishment of a security committee, said no group would remain above the law.
It said recent “bloody developments and lawlessness” in Kerbala were among outbreaks of unrest that had prompted the council to form the committee.
EXPLOSIONS: At least eight explosions were heard on Sunday from the US military base in Fallujah 50 kilometres west of Baghdad where American forces came under attack twice earlier in the day.
Several blasts were heard from inside the camp at 8pm (1700 GMT) and flares shot in the air by soldiers lit up the sky, an AFP correspondent reported. The source of the blasts was not clear.
Earlier on Sunday, an Iraqi was killed and another wounded when US soldiers returned fire after coming under attack in the flashpoint Iraqi city.
US soldiers were removing a truck, hit earlier by a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG), when a second RPG whizzed by them at 3pm (1200 GMT) and the troops returned fire, wounding two Iraqi bystanders, one fatally, an AFP correspondent witnessed.
Marwan Hayad al-Issawi, 20, later died of his wounds, said Fallujah hospital official Ahmed Kazem.
BYSTANDERS KILLED: Two Iraqi bystanders were killed and 15 others wounded when an explosive device blew up as police worked to defuse it in a village northeast of Baghdad, police said on Sunday.
The officers had found the device in the Dali Abbas village and began to defuse it late on Saturday, but it exploded, killing two people among a crowd that had gathered.
Fifteen people were wounded according to police Captain Mohammed Saleh.—Agencies
