September 29, 2007	Saturday	Ramazan 16, 1428

BAGHDAD, Sept 28: US forces were accused of killing 10 people, including women and children, in a Baghdad raid on Friday, one day after launching a probe into a similar incident in Babahan village which killed nine civilians.

Iraqi officials said the early-morning air raid targeted a building in the Al-Saha neighbourhood in southwestern Baghdad where families were sleeping.

Bodies were pulled out of the rubble of the building, which was destroyed.

“Ten people were killed and seven wounded when American helicopters attacked Building No 139 at 2.00 am. We have no idea of the reason for the attack,” said an interior ministry official.

An official at Baghdad’s Al-Yarmuk hospital said 13 people — seven men, two women and four children — were killed and 10 men and a woman were wounded.

He said all the casualties were civilians.

The survivors had said their building had been attacked by US helicopters early in the morning, the hospital official said.

The US military has not immediately commented.

The reported attack came as the US military announced an inquiry into a separate incident in which the bodies of five women and four children had been found in a central village raided by American soldiers looking for Al Qaeda insurgents earlier in the week.

An earlier military statement said a raid by ground and air forces had been carried out on Tuesday on a building in Babahan village near the town of Musayyib, about 50 kilometres south of Baghdad.

“According to Iraqi police, the bodies of five adult women and four children were taken to a local hospital in Musayyib on Wednesday,” the statement said.

“Structures in the area have historically been found to be used as safe houses for Al Qaeda,” it added. “Coalition Forces searching a nearby house located (bomb)-making material including command wire, batteries and timers.” An Iraqi army officer, Lieutenant Hamid al-Lami, said the house targeted in the Babahan raid belonged to Daham Kadhem al-Janabi, leader of Al Qaeda in the area. “He was in charge on carrying out many attacks against US troops and civilians, he was not at home at the time of the raid,” Lami said on Friday.

“The Americans always use air assaults in this area because it is orchards and farms,” he said, adding that those killed were mainly relatives of Janabi, including children aged one, two, four and five years old.

Another Iraqi army officer, meanwhile, said that three people were wounded in a clash between rival Sunni groups in Jurf al-Sakhr, a village about 60kms south of Baghdad, in the so-called triangle of death.

One of the groups was aligned to Al Qaeda and the other was a new formation of Sunnis opposed to the extremist jihadi group, the officer said.

The US military, meanwhile, reported on Friday that the bodies of an abducted Iraqi police lieutenant and his wife were found dumped on a garbage heap in Baghdad’s Sunni-dominated Adhamiyah neighbourhood four days ago.

“Both victims appeared to have been killed by gunshot wounds to the head.

The police lieutenant also had drill holes in his face that indicate he was tortured before being executed,” a military statement said.

A separate statement said a US helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing after being hit by small arms fire at a military base south of Baghdad two days ago.

“A team of two Apaches were responding to ground troops in contact with enemy forces when one was hit and conducted a hard landing after disrupting the attack,” the statement said, adding that no one was injured in the attack.—AFP