Two Japanese diplomats among 10 killed: Widespread violence in Iraq
TIKRIT, Nov 30: Two Japanese diplomats were shot dead in Iraq as they stopped at a food stall en route to Tikrit, where an aid conference was taking place, a US military spokesman said on Sunday.
“Two Japanese were killed as they stopped at a roadside food stall, four kilometres south of Mukayshifa on the afternoon of Nov 29,” said Colonel Bill MacDonald, spokesman for the US 4th Infantry Division, which patrols the troubled region.
The driver of the two Japanese diplomats was also killed in the attack, police and medical staff revealed on Sunday as his body arrived at the Japanese embassy in Baghdad.
Medics at Tikrit’s Teaching Hospital named the dead man as Jerges Salem, born in 1949, an embassy driver who was Iraqi, not Lebanese as previously reported.
“The three persons had stopped for food and drink when attackers fired small-calibre weapons at them.
The three were taken to a Tikrit hospital, said MacDonald, speaking shortly before the opening of the aid conference at the fortified 4th Infantry Division’s headquarters compound in Tikrit, 180 kilometres north of Baghdad.
Japan said the two diplomats were heading to an aid meeting in Tikrit, but US military officials would not say whether the two had planned to attend the gathering at the 4th ID base.
Mukayshifa is some 15 kilometres south of Tikrit.
US officials said the two diplomats did not have an American military escort.
US SOLDIERS: Two US soldiers were killed and one wounded when their convoy was ambushed with rocket-propelled grenade and small arms fire near the troubled town of Husayabah on the Syrian border, the US military said in Baghdad on Sunday.
The soldiers from the 3rd Armoured Cavalry Regiment (3rd ACR) were ambushed on the main Euphrates valley highway east of the town on Saturday afternoon, said a statement from the regional command in the western town of Ramadi.
“Confirmed reports are that two US soldiers were killed and one wounded. The wounded soldier was subsequently medevaced to a nearby field hospital.
SOUTH KOREANS:Two South Koreans were killed and two others seriously wounded in an attack on a highway near Tikrit, the South Korean Foreign Ministry said in Seoul on Monday, according to Yonhap news agency.
The identity of the two dead men has not yet been confirmed but the two wounded were Lee Sang-won and Im Dae-shik, ministry director-general Lee Kwang-jae, in charge of Asian and Middle East affairs, was quoted as saying. Both injured men were employees of a South Korean electric company, it said.
Im may survive but Lee Sang-won was said to be in a critical condition, the official said.
Acting ambassador to Iraq Son Se-ju reported that the victims were working on an electric cable project near Tikrit.
They were staying at a motel in Baghdad and were probably on their way to Tikrit, Son reported.
A US military spokesman confirmed three people died on Sunday in an attack on a convoy in northern Iraq, but refused to confirm South Korean contractors were involved.
“A convoy travelling through 4th Infantry Division and Task Force Ironhorse area of operations was attacked and three people were killed on the afternoon of Nov 30 west of Samarra,” said Sergeant Robert Cargie, a spokesman for the 4th ID.
“This incident did not involve coalition forces,” he said.
COLOMBIAN CONTRACTOR: A Colombian civilian contractor was shot dead and two colleagues wounded in an attack on a convoy in northern Iraq, a US army commander said in Baghdad on Sunday.
“Yesterday morning near Balad one civilian contractor, a citizen of Colombia, was killed and two associates were wounded when attackers using small calibre weapons fired on a convoy,” US military deputy director for operations Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt told a Baghdad press conference.
IRAQIS KILLED: Three Iraqis died on Sunday when a bomb they were planting by a roadside blew up prematurely west of this northern oil city, police said.
The blast occurred at 4:00 pm (1300 GMT) on a road frequented by US military convoys in the Hawijah region 50 kilometres west of Kirkuk, said 2nd Lieutenant Wathban Sultan al-Juamyli.
One man was planting the bomb and two accomplices waiting in a car were all killed by the blast. The police officer said the men, in their 30s, were from the Jabburi and Bajjari tribes.—AFP
