down with murder inc

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 1
BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier died from wounds caused by a mortar attack that struck his patrol on Saturday in southern Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement.
BAIJI - Sixteen civilians were wounded when a car bomb exploded targeting a U.S. patrol near Baiji, 180 km (112 miles) north of Baghdad, local authorities said.
BAGHDAD - Eight car bombs exploded in the capital, injuring one police officer, police said. - alertnet.org

Two Dead as Iraqi Police Fire on Protesters in Kirkuk
By VOA News 01 January 2006
Police in northern Iraq say security forces have killed at least two people and wounded several others who were protesting a rise in fuel prices and lack of basic services in the city.
Authorities say Sunday's riot broke out in a mainly Kurdish district of Kirkuk, as angry protesters set fire to several gas stations and an oil company building in the city. Police later imposed a curfew.
In Baghdad, a bomb blast near one of Iraq's largest oil refineries triggered a pipeline fire that threatened to worsen the country's oil crisis. The bombing was the second in recent days.
Meanwhile, Iraqi police say at least 11 car bombs - most of them in Baghdad - exploded Sunday, wounding at least 20 people. - via globalsecurity.org

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 2
*BAGHDAD - Gunmen on Baghdad's airport road fired on the convoy of the Turkish ambassador. Iraqi police said the envoy was slightly injured. Turkish officials said no one was hurt.
*BAGHDAD - The bodies of eight people, bound and shot in the head, were found in a southern suburb of Baghdad, police said.
*BAGHDAD - Two Iraqi policemen were killed in a clash with insurgents in western Baghdad, police said.
*ISKANDARIYA - Police found three bodies with gunshot wounds on Sunday in Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
*BAQUBA - Seven policemen were killed and 13 wounded near Baquba when a suicide car bomber rammed his car into a bus carrying 20 policemen heading to a Kurdish city in northern Iraq, medical and police sources said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen attacked a car carrying a family of four, killing two children and wounding the parents as they drove on the road between Tikrit and the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said. The motive of the attack was not clear.
KIRKUK - Gunmen shot dead the driver of an ambulance in Kirkuk, police said.
KIRKUK - An Iraqi civilian was seriously wounded when a makeshift bomb targeting a U.S. patrol in Kirkuk exploded, police said. - alertnet.org

Iraq oil exports fall to lowest since war-official
02 Jan 2006 11:07:37 GMT Source: Reuters
BAGHDAD, Jan 2 (Reuters) - Iraq's oil exports fell to 1.1 million barrels per day in December from 1.2 million barrels in November, the lowest since exports began after the war in 2003, a senior oil official said on Monday.
Shamkhi Faraj, Director General of Economics and Oil Marketing, said that the fall was due to security problems in the north and bad weather at southern ports which halted exports for more than a week last month.
"Exports hit a low level in December at 1.1 million BPD. This is the lowest since exporting began again after the war," he told Reuters.
"The exports fell back because of the security situation. Exports from north are totally on hold. We also had bad weather in the south," he said. - alertnet.org

U.S. Has End in Sight on Iraq Rebuilding
Documents Show Much of the Funding Diverted to Security, Justice System and Hussein Inquiry
By Ellen Knickmeyer - Washington Post Foreign Service - Monday, January 2, 2006; A01
BAGHDAD -- The Bush administration does not intend to seek any new funds for Iraq reconstruction in the budget request going before Congress in February, officials say. The decision signals the winding down of an $18.4 billion U.S. rebuilding effort in which roughly half of the money was eaten away by the insurgency, a buildup of Iraq's criminal justice system and the investigation and trial of Saddam Hussein.
Just under 20 percent of the reconstruction package remains unallocated. When the last of the $18.4 billion is spent, U.S. officials in Baghdad have made clear, other foreign donors and the fledgling Iraqi government will have to take up what authorities say is tens of billions of dollars of work yet to be done merely to bring reliable electricity, water and other services to Iraq's 26 million people.
"The U.S. never intended to completely rebuild Iraq," Brig. Gen. William McCoy, the Army Corps of Engineers commander overseeing the work, told reporters at a recent news conference. In an interview this past week, McCoy said: "This was just supposed to be a jump-start."
Since the reconstruction effort began in 2003, midcourse changes by U.S. officials have shifted at least $2.5 billion from the rebuilding of Iraq's decrepit electrical, education, water, sewage, sanitation and oil networks to build new security forces for Iraq and to construct a nationwide system of medium- and maximum-security prisons and detention centers that meet international standards, according to reconstruction officials and documents. Many of the changes were forced by an insurgency more fierce than the United States had expected when its troops entered Iraq.
In addition, from 14 percent to 22 percent of the cost of every nonmilitary reconstruction project goes toward security against insurgent attacks, according to reconstruction officials in Baghdad. In Washington, the office of the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction puts the security costs of each project at 25 percent.
U.S. officials more than doubled the size of the Iraqi army, which they initially planned to build to only 40,000 troops. An item-by-item inspection of reallocated funds reveals how priorities were shifted rapidly to fund initiatives addressing the needs of a new Iraq: a 300-man Iraqi hostage-rescue force that authorities say stages operations almost every night in Baghdad; more than 600 Iraqis trained to dispose of bombs and protect against suicide bombs; four battalions of Iraqi special forces to protect the oil and electric networks; safe houses and armored cars for judges; $7.8 million worth of bulletproof vests for firefighters; and a center in the city of Kirkuk for treating victims of torture.
At the same time, the hundreds of Americans and Iraqis who have devoted themselves to the reconstruction effort point to 3,600 projects that the United States has completed or intends to finish before the $18.4 billion runs out around the end of 2006. These include work on 900 schools, construction of hospitals and nearly 160 health care centers and clinics, and repairs on or construction of nearly 800 miles of highways, city streets and village roads.
But the insurgency has set back efforts across the board. In two of the most crucial areas, electricity and oil production, relentless sabotage has kept output at or below prewar levels despite the expenditure of hundreds of millions of American dollars and countless man-hours. Oil production stands at roughly 2 million barrels a day, compared with 2.6 million before U.S. troops entered Iraq in March 2003, according to U.S. government statistics.
The national electrical grid has an average daily output of 4,000 megawatts, about 400 megawatts less than its prewar level.
Iraqis nationwide receive on average less than 12 hours of power a day. For residents of Baghdad, it was six hours a day last month, according to a U.S. count, though many residents say that figure is high.
The Americans, said Zaid Saleem, 26, who works at a market in Baghdad, "are the best in destroying things but they are the worst in rebuilding."
The Price of Security
In a speech on Aug. 8, 2003, President Bush promised more for Iraq.
"In a lot of places, the infrastructure is as good as it was at prewar levels, which is satisfactory, but it's not the ultimate aim. The ultimate aim is for the infrastructure to be the best in the region," Bush said.
U.S. officials at the time promised a steady supply of 6,000 megawatts of electricity and a return to oil production output of 2.5 million barrels a day, within months.
But the insurgency changed everything.
"Good morning, gentlemen," a security contractor in shirt-sleeves said crisply late last week, launching into a security briefing in what amounts to a reconstruction war room in Baghdad's Green Zone, home to much of the Iraqi government.
Other private security contractors hunched over desks in front of him, learning the state of play for what would be roughly 200 missions that day to serve the 865 U.S. reconstruction projects underway -- taking inspectors to work sites, guarding convoys of building materials or escorting dignitaries to see works in progress, among other jobs.
A screen overhead detailed the previous day's 70 or so attacks on private, military and Iraqi security forces. The briefer noted bombs planted in potholes, rigged in cars, hidden in the vests of suicide attackers. There were also mortar attacks and small-arms fire. The briefer also noted miles of roads rendered impassable or where travel was inadvisable owing to attacks, and some of the previous day's toll in terms of dead and wounded.
Colored blocks on the screen marked convoys en route, each tracked by transponders and equipped with panic buttons.
To one side, a TV monitor scrolled out the day's news, including McCoy's remark to reporters that December was the worst month on record for Iraqi contractors working on reconstruction, with more killed, wounded or kidnapped than during any other month since the U.S. invasion.
"For every three steps forward, we take one step back. Those are the conditions we face," said Col. Bjarne Iverson, commander of the reconstruction operations center. He followed with a comment often used by American authorities in Iraq: "There are people who just want us to fail here."
The heavy emphasis on security, and the money it would cost, had not been anticipated in the early months of the U.S. occupation. In January 2004, after the first disbursements of the $18.4 billion reconstruction package, the United States planned only $3.2 billion to build up Iraq's army and police. But as the insurgency intensified, money was shifted from other sectors, including more than $1 billion earmarked for electricity, to build a police force and army capable of combating foreign and domestic guerrillas.
In addition to training and equipping police and soldiers, money has been spent for special operations and quick-response forces, commandos and other special police, as well as public-order brigades, hostage-rescue forces, infrastructure guards and other specialized units.
In the process, the United States will spend $437 million on border fortresses and guards, about $100 million more than the amount dedicated to roads, bridges and public buildings, including schools. Education programs have been allocated $99 million; the United States is spending $107 million to build a secure communications network for security forces.
Hundreds of millions of dollars were shifted to fund elections and to take Iraq through four changes of government. Funds were also reallocated to provide a $767 million increase in spending on Iraq's justice system. The money has gone toward building or renovating 10 medium- and maximum-security prisons -- early plans called for four prisons -- and for detention centers nationwide.
Tens of millions of dollars more are going to pay for courts, prosecutors and investigations. Millions are going to create safe houses for judges and for witness protection programs.
The criminal justice spending has been intertwined with the drive to try Hussein. The costs have been high, including $128 million to exhume and examine at least five mass grave sites.
A Gap in Perspective
The shifts in allocations have led Stuart Bowen, the inspector general in charge of tracking the $18.4 billion, to talk of a "reconstruction gap," or the difference between what Iraqis and Americans expected from the U.S. reconstruction effort at first and what they are seeing now.
The inspector general's office is conducting an audit to quantify the shortfall between expectations and performance, spokesman Jim Mitchell said.
McCoy, the Army Corps of Engineers commander for reconstruction, cites a poll conducted earlier last year that found less than 30 percent of Iraqis knew that any reconstruction efforts were underway. The percentage has since risen to more than 40 percent, McCoy said.
"It is easy for the Americans to say, 'We are doing reconstruction in Iraq,' and we hear that. But to make us believe it, they should show us where this reconstruction is," said Mustafa Sidqi Murthada, owner of a men's clothing store in Baghdad. "Maybe they are doing this reconstruction for them in the Green Zone. But this is not for the Iraqis." "Believe me, they are not doing this," he said, "unless they consider rebuilding of their military bases reconstruction."
U.S. officials say comparatively minor sabotage to distribution systems is keeping Iraqis from seeing the gains from scores of projects to increase electricity generation and oil production. To showcase a rebuilt school or government building, meanwhile, is to invite insurgents to bomb it.
If 2006 brings political stability and an easing of the insurgency, Americans say, the distribution systems can be fairly easily repaired.
"The good news is this investment is not in any way lost; they're there," said Dan Speckhard, the director of the U.S. reconstruction management office in Iraq. "They will pay off, they will be felt, if not this month, then six months down the road."
While the Bush administration is not seeking any new reconstruction funds for Iraq, commanders here have military discretionary funds they can use for small reconstruction projects. The U.S. Agency for International Development is expected to undertake some building projects, as it does in 80 other countries, with money from the foreign appropriations bill.
Special correspondent Naseer Nouri contributed to this report. - washingtonpost.com

US air strike hits Iraqi family
Jan 3rd 2006 - Several members of the same family, including women and children, have been killed in a US air strike that destroyed their home in northern Iraq. There was confusion over the number of casualties, but local authorities in the town of Beiji, north of Tikrit, have confirmed at least six dead.
US forces said they acted after seeing three men suspected of planting a roadside bomb enter the house. The raid has prompted anger among some local political leaders. US military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Barry Johnson said the men, who ran into the house after digging a hole, were assesed as a threat to civilians and military forces.
"An unmanned aerial vehicle... observed the would-be attackers as they dug a hole following the common pattern of roadside bomb emplacement," he told the AFP news agency. "The individuals left the road site and were followed from the air to a nearby building. Coalition forces employed precision guided munitions on the structure."
But he did not confirm the number of casualties or whether a roadside bomb has been found.
Local police chief Colonel Sufyan Mustafa said he believed there were no anti-US insurgents present in the house. "Even if there had been, why didn't they surround the area and detain the terrorists instead?," he told the Reuters news agency.
'Historic crime'
Ghadban Nahd Hassan, 56, told AFP that 14 members of his family had been in the house when it was it bombed. "I was with some friends in a small shop 100m away from the house when I heard the bombing at around 2130 (1830 GMT)," he said. "I rushed over to see. My house was destroyed and there was smoke everywhere."
So far, the bodies of a nine-year-old boy, an 11-year-old girl, three women and three men have been found in the rubble, police said. US forces frequently use air strikes in their battle against Iraqi insurgents, in an effort to minimise US casualties.
A local official of the biggest Sunni Arab political group, the Iraqi Islamic Party, called for demonstrations. "This is a historic crime and another catastrophe for the people of Baiji," he told Reuters. "If there were gunmen or criminals in that house, is it right to blow up the whole family?"
Hussein al-Falluji, a lawyer and a national leader of the Sunni-dominated Iraqi Accordance Front, said: "Once again the occupiers have shown their barbarism. They never learn from their mistakes... People's resentment is increasing." BBC

Carnage in Iraq; attacks on funeral, fuel convoy
By Gideon Long BAGHDAD, Jan 4 (Reuters) - A suicide bomber caused carnage at a Shi'ite funeral and gunmen ambushed a vital fuel convoy outside Baghdad amid a wave of attacks that killed more than 50 people on Wednesday, the bloodiest day in Iraq for weeks.
Car bombs went off in the capital and in the recently peaceful Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, suggesting a level of coordination that may be a response by Sunni Arab insurgents to last month's largely peaceful parliamentary election.
The funeral attack was the bloodiest single incident since the vote, killing 36 and wounding 40 in the town of Miqdadiya, 100 km (60 miles) northeast of the capital. The area is rapidly emerging as the most violent in the country, eclipsing the previous hotspots of Falluja and Ramadi to the west.
The victims were gathered at a cemetery to mourn a local member of the Dawa party, headed nationally by Shi'ite Islamist Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari. Assailants fired mortars on them, forcing them to take cover amid the gravestones, before a bomber wearing an explosive vest blew himself up among them, security officials said.
Soon afterwards, rebels armed with rocket-propelled grenades and machineguns ambushed 60 fuel tankers on a road north of Baghdad, destroying 20 of them, police and oil officials said. "The convoy left Baiji and was on its way to Baghdad when it came under fire. So far we know 20 have been destroyed," an oil industry official said.
A group called the Islamic Army in Iraq claimed responsibility for the assault in an Internet statement, saying the convoy belonged "to the enemy occupier", a reference to the 150,000 U.S. troops stationed in the country. The statement did not mention casualties and the Oil Ministry in Baghdad said only one tanker had been destroyed, by a bomb planted at the side of the road. However, by nightfall, police said there were still isolated clashes on the road and at least four people had been killed -- a driver and three members of the convoy's security team. The convoy was part of a major government effort to ease fuel shortages in the capital following the recent closure of Iraq's main refinery at Baiji in the north.
The refinery has now reopened and Iraq has begun to export oil again through its southern ports. The Oil Ministry said Iraq was shipping 1.5 million barrels per day, substantially more than the average for December, when exports slipped to a post- war low of just 1.1 million barrels.
In Baghdad's first fatal car bomb attacks of 2006, at least 13 people were killed and 27 were injured. Five died when a vehicle detonated in the northern Shi'ite district of Kadhimiya and eight perished in a second bombing close to a busy commercial market in the southern area of Doura, police and hospital sources said.
GOVERNMENT TALKS
The violence came as Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish politicians pledged to plough on with efforts to form a national unity government capable of stemming the bloodshed. While much of the violence has been in Diyala province, north of Baghdad, the southern city of Kerbala has been peaceful of late, and Wednesday's car bombing was the first in the Shi'ite holy city since December 2004. Police said three civilians were injured.
In March 2004, coordinated suicide bombings during the annual religious festival of Ashura killed more than 90 people in Kerbala, and any attack there is likely to have had a sectarian motive. Mistrust between Iraq's majority Shi'ite and minority Sunni Arab communities has been heightened by the results of last month's election, which some Sunni and secular leaders charge were rigged to favour the Shi'ites. The Iraqi electoral commission has called in a panel of four international monitors to investigate those claims.
Following a series of bilateral meetings in Kurdistan, political leaders have agreed to meet in Baghdad soon to push their plan for a government capable of stemming the killings and abductions which have become part of daily life for millions of Iraqis since the U.S.-led invasion of 2003.
The latest prominent kidnap victim was the sister of Interior Minister Bayan Jabor, seized in Baghdad on Tuesday. Iraqi security forces launched a major security operation to find her, shutting two major bridges over the River Tigris, closing parts of the city and setting up impromptu checkpoints. The abduction came three months after Jabor's brother was kidnapped and held for one night. Jabor, an Islamist Shi'ite, is a hate figure for Sunni Arab rebels and has strenuously denied their allegations that his ministry condones Shi'ite death squads targeting them.
(Additional reporting by Haider Salaheddin, Mariam Karouny, Aseel Kami and Alastair Macdonald in Baghdad, Faris al-Mehdawi in Baquba and Sami Jumaili in Kerbala) - alertnet.org

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 4
* NEAR BAGHDAD - Gunmen ambushed a convoy of 60 fuel tankers on a road just north of Baghdad, destroying 20 and killing a driver and three members of the convoy's security team, police and oil officials said. A group called the Islamic Army in Iraq claimed the attack without giving details. The Oil Ministry gave a different account, saying only one tanker was destroyed, by a roadside bomb.
BAGHDAD - At least eight people were killed and 12 wounded in a car bomb attack in southern Baghdad, police and hospital sources said. The car was parked close to a busy commercial market in the Doura district, they said.
KERBALA - At least three people were wounded when a car bomb exploded in the Shi'ite holy city of Kerbala, police said. The target of the attack was unclear.
MUQDADIYA - At least 36 people were killed and 40 wounded when a suicide bomber wearing an explosive vest blew himself up during the funeral of a member of one of Iraq's main Shi'ite Muslim political parties in Muqdadiya, 100 km (60 miles) northeast of Baghdad, police security officials said.
LATIFIYA - An Iraqi soldier was killed and two wounded when a bomb went off near their patrol in Latifiya, in an area dubbed the "Triangle of Death" south of Baghdad, an army source said.
BAGHDAD - A car bomb attack in a Shi'ite district of northern Baghdad killed five and injured 15. Police had earlier put the death toll at three, with 13 wounded.
ISKANDARIYA - Two Iraqi policemen were wounded on Tuesday when a makeshift bomb went off near their patrol in Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
KIRKUK - Two civilians were killed and two others wounded when a bomb exploded targeting a U.S. patrol, police said.
BAGHDAD - Two police commandos were killed and nine others wounded when mortar rounds landed on their checkpoint in western Baghdad, a hospital source said.
BALAD - U.S. forces killed one suspected insurgent and wounded another on Monday near Balad, 90 km (55 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement.
HAWIJA - U.S. forces arrested two insurgents near Hawija, southwest of the northern city of Kirkuk, the U.S. military said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed a senior official at the Oil Ministry, along with his son, in an attack on his car in western Baghdad, police said. The driver was wounded.
BAGHDAD - Two guards of Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of one of Iraq's most powerful Shi'ite political parties, were shot dead on Tuesday while attending a funeral in southern Baghdad, police said.
MAHAWIL - The bodies of two people, bound, gagged and shot dead, were found in Mahawil, about 75 km west of Baghdad, police said. - alertnet.org

Some 120 killed in one of Iraq's bloodiest days
By Sami Jumaili and Ammar Alwani Thu Jan 5 KERBALA/RAMADI, Iraq (Reuters) - Two suicide bombers killed 120 people and wounded more than 200 in attacks near a Shi'ite holy shrine and a police recruiting center on Thursday, the bloodiest day in Iraq for four months.
Seven U.S. soldiers were killed in two roadside bomb attacks, three bombs exploded in Baghdad and insurgents sabotaged an oil pipeline near the northern city of Kirkuk, causing a huge fire.
Coming a day after 58 people died in a wave of bombings and shootings, the latest bloodshed ratcheted up tension between Iraq's minority Sunni Arabs and majority Shi'ite Muslims. The suicide bombers struck in Kerbala, one of Shi'ite Islam's holiest cities, and Ramadi, a Sunni Arab stronghold in western Anbar province and a hotbed of the insurgency.
"This is a war against Shi'ites," said Rida Jawad al-Takia, a senior member of the Supreme Council for Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI), one of the country's leading Shi'ite parties. "Apparently to the terrorists, no Shi'ite child or woman should live," he told Reuters. "We are really worried. It seems they want a civil war."
The bombings shattered hopes Iraq might start 2006 on a more peaceful footing than in 2005, allowing for a swift withdrawal of some of the 150,000 U.S. troops in the country.
BLOODIEST WEEKS
In all, violence has killed more than 240 people and wounded more than 280 in the five days since the New Year started, a death toll comparable with some of the nation's bloodiest weeks since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003.
Thursday's U.S. death toll was the highest for a single day since last month's parliamentary elections, which have yet to produce a government. Final results from the vote are expected soon but it could be months before a new parliament is formed.
President Jalal Talabani blamed the attacks on "groups of dark terror" and said they would fail to stop Iraqis forming a national unity government capable of meeting the demands of the country's rival sects and ethnic groups.
The Kerbala bomber detonated an explosive belt laced with ball bearings and a grenade, killing 50 and wounding 138 at a market within sight of the golden dome of the Imam Hussein shrine, one of the holiest sites in Shi'ite Islam. Television pictures showed pools of blood in the street, which was littered with debris. Passers-by loaded the wounded into the backs of cars and vans, and one black-clad woman stood crying while clutching her dead or wounded baby to her chest.
On Wednesday, a car bomb wounded three people in the first attack of its kind in Kerbala since December 2004. In March 2004 coordinated suicide bombings during an annual religious festival in the city killed more than 90 people.
POLICE RECRUITS TARGETED
About an hour after the blast, another bomber blew himself up near police recruits in the western city of Ramadi, killing 70 people and wounding 65, hospital sources said. The U.S. military said the blast ripped through a line of some 1,000 men waiting to be security screened at a glass and ceramics works that was used as a temporary recruiting center. After the debris and body parts had been cleared away, hundreds of Iraqis returned to the queue, the military said.
Guerrillas have often attacked Iraqi police and army recruits, whom the Americans hope will eventually replace them in the fight against the largely Sunni Arab insurgency, allowing U.S. troops to withdraw. Many young Iraqi men are drawn to work in the security forces by the promise of relatively high pay.
The deaths of the seven U.S. soldiers took the number of U.S. military fatalities since the March 2003 invasion to oust Saddam Hussein to 2,189, according to Reuters figures. Five were killed by a roadside bomb in Baghdad and two were killed by a similar device near the southern city of Najaf.
Other devices exploded in Baghdad, but with less impact. Three car bombs, two of them suicide attacks, rocked the capital in quick succession, suggesting a level of coordination that may be a response by Sunni Arab insurgents to the largely peaceful parliamentary elections. The bombs killed two people.
The Kerbala and Ramadi bombings were the bloodiest attacks in Iraq since September 14 when a suicide bomber killed 114 people in a Shi'ite district of Baghdad. Some 150 were killed that day. Mistrust between Shi'ites and Sunnis has been heightened by the results of last month's elections, which some Sunni and secular leaders say were rigged to favor the Shi'ites. After a series of bilateral meetings in Kurdistan, political leaders have agreed to meet in Baghdad soon to push their plan for a national unity government able to stem the bloodshed.
(Additional reporting by Mariam Karouny, Gideon Long, Ahmed Rasheed, Omar al-Ibadi, Hiba Moussa and Ross Colvin in Baghdad) - news.yahoo.com

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 6
KERBALA - The death toll in Thursday's suicide bomb attack in the southern city of Kerbala rose to 53 killed and 148 wounded. Hospital sources said four Iranian tourists were among the dead.
RAMADI - Two U.S. soldiers were killed in the suicide bombing that killed scores of police recruits in Ramadi, 110km (60 miles) west of Baghdad, on Thursday, the U.S. military said on Friday.
BAGHDAD - Two U.S. soldiers were killed in Baghdad on Thursday when an improvised explosive device struck their vehicle while on patrol, the U.S. military said on Friday.
* FALLUJA - Two U.S. soldiers were killed by small arms fire in Falluja 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad on Thursday, the U.S. military said on Friday. - alertnet.org

Wife urges release of elderly UK hostage in Iraq
DUBAI, Jan 6 (Reuters) - The wife of a 74-year-old British hostage in Iraq called on his abductors to free him in a televised appeal on Friday, saying he was "a man of peace".
Briton Norman Kember, American Tom Fox and Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Sooden were kidnapped on Nov. 26 in Baghdad, where they were working with a Christian peace organisation, by a group calling itself the Swords of Truth.
"Norman was a man of peace and he had gone to Iraq with his three colleagues on a charity mission," Pat Kember said on Al Jazeera television, in remarks translated into Arabic.
"I know that Norman would want to continue his charity work in the future," she said. "I want him to return home soon. We all need him here, his friends and family."
The previously-unknown group issued a video of the four men and accused them of being spies of U.S.-led forces. It threatened to kill them unless prisoners in Iraqi jails were freed.
Muslim scholars and activists from around the world, including leaders of the militant Hamas and Hizbollah groups, have appealed for the release of the aid workers.
Thousands of civilians have been kidnapped since the fall of Saddam Hussein, including more than 200 foreigners seized by gangs seeking ransom or insurgents trying to pressure their governments to withdraw from Iraq. Many hostages have been released, but around 50 have been killed. - alertnet.org

al-Zawahiri knew of 'troop re-allignment'
before Bush suggested it...[hmmm..]

Al-Qaeda broadcasts new message
The deputy leader of al-Qaeda, Ayman al-Zawahiri, has appeared in a new videotape shown by Arabic satellite television station al-Jazeera. In the tape, he claims that US hints of a future reduction of troops in Iraq are "a victory for Islam". And he calls on US President George W Bush to admit defeat in Iraq and Afghanistan and says he will soon be defeated in Palestine. Al-Jazeera says the videotape dates from December.
The Egyptian-born former eye surgeon wears a white turban and a grey robe with an automatic rifle positioned behind him, in a pose typical of past videotaped recordings.
"I congratulate the Muslims on Islam's victory in Iraq. I said more than a year ago that the Americans' departure from Iraq is only a matter of time," he says. "Bush, you must admit that you have been defeated in Iraq and that you are being defeated in Afghanistan and that you will soon be defeated in Palestine, with the help and strength of God," he also says.
Wanted men
Mr Bush said on Wednesday that the US would aim to put more Iraqi territory under the control of Iraqi security forces during 2006. He added that if Iraqis made good progress, "we can discuss further possible adjustments" in US troop levels, although he refused to outline a timetable for withdrawal.
However, Zawahiri is likely to have made the tape before Mr Bush gave his comments. Al-Jazeera says the video carried the date of the Muslim lunar month which ended in December.
Zawahiri is regarded as Osama Bin Laden's right-hand man. The two have evaded capture since US-led forces brought down the Taleban regime in Afghanistan in 2001 following the 9/11 attacks on the US. - bbc.co.uk

Cheney rallies the troops

"As the ISF gains strength and experience, and as the political process advances, we'll be able to transfer more and more responsibility to the Iraqis, and eventually decrease troop levels without losing our capacity to defeat the terrorists. And I assure you: Any decisions about troop levels will be driven by conditions on the ground and by the judgment of our commanders -- not by artificial timelines set by politicians in Washington, D.C. " (Applause.)
"Recently there have been some prominent voices advocating a sudden withdrawal of our forces from Iraq. Some have suggested the war is not winnable, a few seem almost eager to conclude that the struggle was already lost. But they are wrong. The only way to lose this fight is to quit -- and that is not an option."
[snip]
"It seems more than obvious to say that our nation is still at risk of attack. Yet as we get farther away from September 11th, some in Washington are yielding to the temptation to downplay the threat, and to back away from the business at hand. That mindset may be comforting but it is dangerous. We're all grateful this nation has gone four years and four months without another 9/11."
" Obviously, no one can guarantee that we won't be hit again. But getting through four years of wartime without an attack on the homeland was more than just a matter of luck. We've been protected by sensible policy decisions, by decisive action at home and abroad, and by round-the-clock efforts on the part of people in the armed services, in law enforcement, in intelligence, and homeland security."
"The enemy that struck on 9/11 is weakened and fractured, yet still lethal and still determined to hit us again. We have faced, and are facing today, enemies who hate us, who hate our country, and hate the liberties for which we stand. They dwell in the shadows, wear no uniform, have no regard for the laws of warfare, and feel unconstrained by any standard of morality. It's a serious fight -- and we have a lot more to do before it's finished. Either we are serious about fighting this war or we are not. And the enemies of America need to know: We are serious, and we will not let down our guard. " (Applause.)
"Ladies and gentlemen, as members of the United States Armed Forces, each one of you is helping to write a proud chapter in the history of freedom."
remarks by Vice President Cheney at a rally for the troops:Fort Leavenworth - Jan 2006

another Journalist abducted

Female US journalist kidnapped in Baghdad: police
Sat Jan 7, 5:25 AM ET BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Unknown gunmen kidnapped a female U.S. journalist in Baghdad on Saturday after shooting dead her driver, police said.
They said she had been on her way to a meeting with a Sunni Arab leader when she was kidnapped in the Adel district near Malik bin Anas mosque in west Baghdad. Immediately after the incident, American and Iraqi troops sealed off the area, witnesses said.
Thousands of civilians have been kidnapped since the fall of Saddam Hussein, including more than 200 foreigners seized by gangs seeking ransom or insurgents trying to force their governments to withdraw from Iraq. Many hostages have been released, but around 50 have been killed.
There has been a spate of kidnappings of Westerners over the past few months after a lull during most of 2005. Four Christian peace activists and a French engineer are among those still being held captive.
The wife of the British captive, 74-year-old Norman Kember, called on his abductors to free him in a televised appeal on Friday, saying he was "a man of peace."
Kember, American Tom Fox and Canadians James Loney and Harmeet Sooden were kidnapped on November 26 in Baghdad, where they were working with a Christian peace organization, by a group calling itself the Swords of Truth. - news.yahoo.com

more false promises

UK's Straw calls for Iraqi unity
UK Foreign Secretary Jack Straw has promised full international backing for a government of national unity in Iraq. Mr Straw was speaking in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, after meeting political leaders including Prime Minister Ibrahim Jaafari.
Mr Jaafari reaffirmed that the next government would be enlarged to include all the main parties. Iraqis voted in an election last month, with early results suggesting a lead for the main Shia coalition.
Visiting Basra on Friday, Mr Straw raised the possibility that some UK troops might pull out of one or two of the southern provinces within months. Correspondents say the UK government clearly hopes Iraq is entering a new phase of greater independence.
On Saturday, a car bomb injured several troops and civilians in Baghdad. Security officials said the vehicle blew up as an Iraqi army patrol passed by in the south-east of the capital, wounding at least 13 people.
Positive talks
Mr Straw has been holding back-to-back meetings with virtually all the key figures in the Iraqi leadership, including not only the Kurdish foreign minister and president and Shia prime minister, but also representatives of Sunni groups. Speaking to the BBC on the second day of his previously unannounced visit, Mr Straw said the talks had been encouraging.
"[The politicians] expressed their determination to see the Iraqi security forces continue to be strengthened to fight... terrorism themselves and to establish this broad-based coalition government of national unity which all Iraqi politicians know in their head, if not in their heart yet, has to be the future for Iraq," he said.
Mr Straw said there had been a "dramatic" increase in the number of Iraqi security forces being trained over recent months.
"What is more there is now very great day-to-day, hour-to-hour, co-operation between the coalition commanders and Iraqi commanders in very many of provinces," he said. "The Iraqi politicians I meet are not pressing the coalition for less action against the terrorists and insurgents but for more action and tougher action."
The BBC's Bridget Kendall, who is travelling with Mr Straw, says any delay in forming a new government could deepen the rift between Shia and Sunni and risk pulling the country apart. - BBC

more death

11 U.S.soldiers killed as new wave of violence sweeps Iraq
Big News Network.com Friday 6th January, 2006
Eleven U.S. soldiers were slain in a single day Thursday in a wave of violence sweeping Iraq which has killed more than 200 Iraqis in 48 hours.
The U.S. military said on Friday that 6 U.S. troops had met their death Thursday, taking the toll for the day to eleven.
The suicide bomb attack on a Ramadi police recuiting station on Thursday that killed 58 Iraqis and injured scores of others, also claimed the life of a U.S. soldier and a U.S. Marine. Another two American soldiers died when their motor vehicle struck an improvised explosive device.
Meanwhile two U.S. Marines were killed by small arms fire in combat in Fallujah, officials said.
The military had previously announced the deaths of five soldiers killed by an improvised explosive device south of Karbala. The attack occurred minutes before a second suicide bomber hit Shiite pilgrims in Karbala, killing 63 Iraqi civilians. - BNN

U.S. Military Seizes Iraqi Reporter for 'The Guardian'
By E&P Published: January 09, 2006 NEW YORK American troops in Baghdad yesterday blasted their way into the home of an Iraqi journalist working for the London daily, The Guardian, and TV's Channel 4, firing bullets into the bedroom where he was sleeping with his wife and children.
Ali Fadhil, who two months ago won the Foreign Press Association young journalist of the year award, was hooded and taken for questioning, the newspaper reports. He was released hours later.
Fadhil is working with and the newspaper and Guardian Films "on an investigation for Channel 4's Dispatches programme into claims that tens of millions of dollars worth of Iraqi funds held by the Americans and British have been misused or misappropriated," the paper reports.
"The troops told Dr. Fadhil that they were looking for an Iraqi insurgent and seized video tapes he had shot for the programme. These have not yet been returned."
The director of the film, Callum Macrae, said yesterday: "The timing and nature of this raid is extremely disturbing. It is only a few days since we first approached the US authorities and told them Ali was doing this investigation, and asked them then to grant him an interview about our findings. - editorandpublisher.com

U.S. raid on Iraq mosque sparks Sunni Arab anger
By Ross Colvin BAGHDAD, Jan 9 (Reuters) - Sunni Arabs in Iraq branded a U.S. raid on a mosque complex a "sinful assault" and said on Monday it would worsen their relations with the U.S. military.
The United Nations also criticised Sunday's U.S. operation.
Sunni Arab political parties said the raid on the Baghdad offices of the influential Muslim Clerics' Association targeted the clergy and violated a place of worship.
Witnesses said American soldiers slid down ropes from helicopters as troops on the ground burst into the mosque complex, blowing doors off hinges and ransacking offices, two days before the major religious holiday of Eid al-Adha.
A U.N. statement from the office of special envoy Ashraf Qazi said he "noted with regret the incident at the Umm al-Qora mosque" and that it "underlined the importance of all parties respecting the sanctity of holy sites and places of worship".
A U.N. spokeswoman, amplifying the statement, said Qazi was referring specifically to the U.S. and Iraqi military operation.
The incident appears likely to worsen relations between the U.S. military and Sunni Arabs at a time when Washington is trying to encourage Sunnis to abandon support for a deadly insurgency and embrace the political process.
"It is a direct and deliberate act against Sunnis. It is an assault. It will only worsen the relations with them (the U.S. military)," Abdul Hadi al-Zubeidi, a senior member of a Sunni coalition, the Sunni Gathering, told Reuters.
The U.N. envoy said it "should serve as a reminder of the need to eschew violence and build mutual trust and confidence" in order to "support a fully inclusive political process".
The U.S. military said it conducted the raid on the offices in response to a tip-off of "substantial terrorist activity" there. It said U.S. soldiers behaved respectfully during their search of the premises and the arrests of six people.
The Iraqi Accordance Front, the country's main Sunni Arab coalition, called on its followers to gather at the mosque in Baghdad on Tuesday to protest against the raid.
The raid came on the same day that one of the leaders of the Iraqi Accordance Front, Adnan al-Dulaimi, held talks with President Jalal Talabani on forming a new government encompassing Sunnis, Kurds and the Shi'ite majority.
While the raid appears likely to fuel grievances among the once-dominant Sunni Arab community who feel marginalised under the Shi'ite and Kurdish-led government, it was not immediately clear if it would complicate efforts to form a new government.
Sunni Arab and secular politicians have complained of vote- rigging in the Dec. 15 election, dominated by the main Shi'ite Islamist Alliance. A team of foreign experts are investigating the complaints and final results have still not been announced.
Late on Sunday, the Iraqi Accordance Front issued a statement demanding the release of the six men arrested and called on the U.S. military "to respect the worship places and religious clergy, and never to repeat this in the future".
The Iraqi Islamic Party, part of the main Sunni bloc, described the raid as "an irresponsible act ... against the religious clergy ... and a sharp violation of human rights and a place of worship".
The Muslim Clerics' Association is an influential group of Sunni scholars who hold sway over many Sunnis, especially in western Anbar province, heartland of the insurgency. Its leaders have called on U.S. forces to withdraw from Iraq.
(Additional reporting by Aseel Kami, Alastair Macdonald and Mariam Karouny) - alertnet

Twin suicide bombing in Iraq kills 14 police
Mon Jan 9, 7:18 AM ET BAGHDAD (AFP) - Fourteen policemen were killed and 25 injured when twin suicide bombers attacked Iraq's interior ministry, where ministers and the US ambassador were attending a parade to mark Police Day.
The two bombers, with explosives strapped to their bodies, struck within three minutes of each other at the rear entrance to the ministry in Baghdad as a parade took place some 400 metres (yards) away, security officials said. Ambulances rushed to the scene as police cordoned off the area, which had already been closed to traffic ahead of the ceremony. The 14 dead, according to an updated toll by the interior ministry, included a major who was responsible for ministry security.
A mortar shell was also fired, but it fell next door in the police academy, causing no damage.
Top officials, including Interior Minister Bayan Jabr Solah, Defence Minister Saadun al-Dulaimi and US ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, were watching the annual celebration. A US embassy spokesman said he understood that Khalilzad was fine.
A group called the Army of the Victorious Community claimed responsibility for the mortar attack, but said nothing about the suicide bombers.
"We mortared the lair of the interior ministry, targeting the infidels who were celebrating Police Day," the militant group said in an Internet statement, which could not be independently authenticated.
The latest bloodshed came as the electoral commission announced a delay in releasing its findings into fraud allegations in last month's Iraqi elections.
"There are still four to five small outstanding items," Abdul Hussein al-Hindawi, a member of the Iraqi electoral commission board, told AFP.
He expected the findings to be announced next weekend, following the three-day Muslim Eid al-Fitr holiday. The delay would also give extra time to a group of foreign monitors to finish a separate probe into the December 15 poll -- the first to elect a permanent parliament in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein in April 2003, said Hindawi
The International Mission for Iraqi Elections has spent the past week observing how the commission conducted vote counting and handled complaints.
Meanwhile, US military officials were investigating the cause of a deadly helicopter crash in a remote area of northwestern Iraq on Saturday night that left eight US service personnel and four American citizens dead. The Black Hawk came down near the restive city of Tal Afar in the second deadliest helicopter crash since the US-led invasion of March 2003.
"The investigation is still ongoing," a US military spokesman told AFP.
The latest casualties took the death toll of US soldiers in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion to at least 2,205, according to an AFP tally based on figures from the Pentagon. The developments came as a senior Shiite leader accused US officials of seeking to restrain Iraqi security forces' efforts to clamp down on the ongoing violence that frequently targets Iraq's majority Shiite community.
Abdel Aziz al-Hakim, head of the leading Supreme Council of the Islamic Resistance in Iraq (SCIRI), said people's patience was wearing thin and warned that they might take the law into their own hands. But, in a CNN interview, Hakim insisted there was no sectarian divide between Iraq's Shiite and Sunni community, saying the problem was the insurgent groups, comprising members of the former Baathist regime of Saddam Hussein.
In a bid to disrupt the political process, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who heads Al-Qaeda's Iraq operations, hit out at the Sunni Muslim Iraqi Islamic Party for participating in last month's election.
In an audiotape posted on the Internet Sunday, the Jordanian-born militant who has a 25 million dollar US bounty on his head, called on the party to boycott the political process. Iyad Samerai, a senior member of the Islamic Party, however pledged to stay the political course.
Meanwhile, a French engineer held hostage by insurgents in Iraq for a month was due to return home Monday after being released on Saturday. Bernard Planche, 52, ran away from a farmhouse where he was held after his captors fled US and Iraqi troops who were conducting a search of a rural area on the western outskirts of the capital, the US military said.
In other violence, an Iraqi judge responsible for investigating terrorist-related crimes was killed as he left for work in the northern city of Kirkuk, police said. The US military also said a 56-year-old Iraqi man detained in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison had died on Saturday of an apparent stroke. - news.yahoo.com

US paper names abducted reporter
A US journalist kidnapped in Baghdad at the weekend has been named as Jill Carroll, who was reporting for the Boston-based Christian Science Monitor. The paper has said it is pursuing every avenue to secure her safe release.
Ms Carroll was going to meet the leader of a Sunni coalition party in Baghdad's western Adel district when she was seized and her translator fatally hurt. Iraqi police say they are searching for Ms Carroll. Several Westerners are currently being held hostage in Iraq. The BBC's Alastair Leithead in Baghdad says the Adel district is one of the city's most dangerous, where three Iraqi television journalists were recently killed.
Body found
Ms Carroll, 28, had been reporting from the Middle East for Jordanian, Italian and other media organisations for the past three years, the Christian Science Monitor said in a statement. She and her translator were on their way to meet Adnan al Dulaimi, the head of a prominent Sunni coalition, when they were ambushed. The newspaper quotes the journalist's driver, who survived the attack, saying gunmen stopped the car, dragged him out and drove off with Ms Carroll and her translator. The body of the interpreter was recovered that day, along with identity papers. He has been named by the newspaper as Allan Enwiyah, 32.
No-one has claimed responsibility for the abduction.
Monitor editor Richard Bergenheim said: "We are urgently seeking information about Ms Carroll and are pursuing every avenue to secure her release." The newspaper said it had "tapped into her professionalism, energy and fair reporting on the Iraqi scene" in recent months and praised her determination in seeking accurate views from Iraqi political leaders.
The Monitor describes itself as a non-religious newspaper, published as a public service.
Four Christian peace activists, including a Briton, an American and two Canadians, are being held hostage in Iraq. A French engineer, Bernard Planche, managed to escape his captors at the weekend after being kidnapped in Baghdad in December. - bbc

Cost of Iraq war could top $2 trillion - study
By Jason Szep BOSTON, Jan 9 (Reuters) - The cost of the Iraq war could top $2 trillion, far above the White House's pre-war projections, when long-term costs such as lifetime health care for thousands of wounded U.S. soldiers are included, a study said on Monday. Columbia University economist Joseph E. Stiglitz and Harvard lecturer Linda Bilmes included in their study disability payments for the 16,000 wounded U.S. soldiers, about 20 percent of whom suffer serious brain or spinal injuries. They said U.S. taxpayers will be burdened with costs that linger long after U.S. troops withdraw.
"Even taking a conservative approach, we have been surprised at how large they are," said the study, referring to total war costs. "We can state, with some degree of confidence, that they exceed a trillion dollars."
Before the invasion, then-White House budget director Mitch Daniels predicted Iraq would be "an affordable endeavor" and rejected an estimate by then-White House economic adviser Lawrence Lindsey of total Iraq war costs at $100 billion to $200 billion as "very, very high."
Unforeseen costs include recruiting to replenish a military drained by multiple tours of duty, slower long-term U.S. economic growth and health-care bills for treating long-term mental illness suffered by war veterans.
They said about 30 percent of U.S. troops had developed mental-health problems within three to four months of returning from Iraq as of July 2005, citing Army statistics.
Stiglitz, who won the Nobel Prize in Economics in 2001 and has been an outspoken critic of the Bush administration's Iraq policy, and Bilmes based their projections partly on past wars and included the economic cost of higher oil prices, a bigger U.S. budget deficit and greater global insecurity caused by the Iraq war.
They said a portion of the rise in oil prices -- about 20 percent of the $25 a barrel gain in oil prices since the war began -- could be attributed directly to the conflict and that this had already cost the United States about $25 billion.
"Americans are, in a sense, poorer by that amount," they said, describing that estimate as conservative.
The projection of a total cost of $2 trillion assumes U.S. troops stay in Iraq until 2010 but with steadily declining numbers each year. They projected the number of troops there in 2006 at about 136,000. Currently, the United States has 153,000 troops in Iraq.
HIGHER COSTS
Marine Corps Lt. Col. Roseann Lynch, a Pentagon spokeswoman, said on Monday that the Iraq war was costing the United States $4.5 billion monthly in military "operating costs" not including procurement of new weapons and equipment. Lynch said the war in Iraq had cost $173 billion to date.
Another unforeseen cost, the study said, is the loss to the U.S. economy from injured veterans who cannot contribute as productively as they otherwise would and costs related to American civilian contractors and journalists killed in Iraq.
Death benefits to military families and bonuses paid to soldiers to re-enlist and to sign up new recruits are additional long-term costs, it said.
Stiglitz was an adviser to U.S. President Bill Clinton and also served as chief economist at the World Bank. (Additional reporting by Charles Aldinger in Washington) - alertnet

[true? or psyops?] Corridors Of Power: The Lady Was A Spy
By Roland Flamini UPI Chief International Correspondent - Washington (UPI) Jan 09, 2006
Susanne Osthoff, the German archeologist kidnapped by Iraqi gunmen on Nov. 25 and released before Christmas was connected with her country's intelligence service, the BND, and had helped arrange a meeting with a top member of the terrorist organization al-Qaida, possibly Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi himself, according to well informed German sources Sunday.
The sources confirmed German press reports that the 43-year-old woman had worked for the BND in Iraq on a freelance basis, and had for some time even stayed in a German intelligence safe house in Baghdad.
A convert to Islam and a fluent Arabic speaker, Osthoff had lived in Iraq for over a decade, and was at one time married to an Iraqi. Archeology is a classic intelligence cover: T.E. Lawrence (Lawrence of Arabia) posed as an archeologist in the Middle East in the early part of the last century.
But archeology is Osthoff's real profession. One Washington-based German source said Osthoff had been working on arranging a rendezvous with an al-Qaida member on behalf of a German intelligence agent in Iraq. Whether the meeting ever took place has not been revealed, but another source in Berlin, reached by telephone, said experts believed that the kidnapping may have been the work of a rival group, possibly within the same organization.
A day after Osthoff's release, the Germans had quietly freed and sent home to his native Lebanon Mohammed Ali Hamadi, a Hezbollah militant serving a sentence for killing a U.S. Navy diver in a hijacked TWA jetliner in 1985. Berlin officials denied any connection between Osthoff's release and Hamadi's after serving only 19 years of a life sentence.
They said Hamadi had qualified for parole and the decision to free him had been taken by the state government in North Rhine Westphalia, where he was being held, not the Federal government. He was captured in Frankfurt in 1987 for his part in hijacking the TWA jetliner and killing the American navy diver, who was a passenger on the plane. The United States requested Hamadi's extradition, but the Germans refused, and instead tried and convicted him.
But both German sources said the real deal involving Osthoff's release had been the payment of a ransom to her terrorist captors by the government of Chancellor Angela Merkel. The ransom and Hamadi's release could well constitute a double embarrassment for Merkel on her scheduled "maiden" visit to Washington next week. Washington has always opposed pay ransom money on the grounds that it encourages more kidnapping.
Although Merkel has carried on her socialist predecessor Gerhard Schroeder's policy of staying out of Iraq, German intelligence is operating in the area, cooperating with U.S. counterparts both on the ground and in Washington, the sources said.
Contacts with homegrown Iraqi insurgent groups are now openly admitted by the U.S. authorities, according to news reports received over the weekend. One objective in talking to Sunni fighters loyal to former dictator Saddam Hussein, or other Sunni militant groups is to exploit growing differences with the "foreign fighters," in other words, al-Qaida, the reports said.
Zarqawi's wholesale terrorist attacks on Iraqis as collaborators with the United States have bred growing resentment against al-Qaida, and the weekend reports spoke of clashes between foreign fighters and Sunni insurgents in various parts of the country.
Talks with the Sunni insurgents are also part of the groundwork for the U.N.-organized National Accord Conference, an inclusive forum set for the spring in Baghdad. The conference bringing together all Iraqi political and religious groups is a follow-up of the Arab League summit in Cairo last October.
That meeting in the Egyptian capital called for an attempt to establish political dialogue with the insurgents in order to determine what they wanted. The script of the Baghdad conference is also expected to demand the withdrawal of all "foreign forces," which is not only a reference to the U.S.-led coalition, but also to non-Iraqi insurgents -- further widening the gap between Sunni insurgents and al-Qaida.
The Germans' tentative contacts with al-Qaida reflect Berlin's belief in the existence of another split within the Iraqi-based al-Qaida organization itself. While Zarqawi calls for the Americans to leave, their departure must be far from his intentions since it would undermine his terrorist mission.
"Assuming the U.S. pullout continues, Zarqawi's days in Iraq are numbered," says a diplomatic source in Washington. This situation is forcing al-Qaida to think strategically about what to do next. - spacewar

German spies deny guiding U.S. bomb raids in Iraq
By Mark Trevelyan, Security Correspondent
BERLIN, Jan 12 (Reuters) - Germany's foreign intelligence agency denied on Thursday reports its spies in Baghdad had helped U.S. warplanes select bombing targets during the invasion of Iraq, which the Berlin government had strongly opposed.
Opposition politicians seized on the report as evidence the then government of Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder had secretly backed the U.S.-led war while making political capital from condemning it in public.
Some demanded an investigation of the security services' role, both in Iraq and in the wider U.S.-led war on terrorism.
"If the reports are confirmed, the previous government can no longer state that it didn't take part in the Iraq war," said Juergen Koppelin, a liberal Free Democrat member of parliament.
German agents in Baghdad at the start of the Iraq war "gave us direct support. They gave us information for targeting," NDR television quoted a former U.S. military official as saying.
He said that on April 7, 2003 -- 18 days after the U.S. bombing began -- the Americans had received a report that a convoy of Mercedes cars, one of them possibly carrying Iraqi President Saddam Hussein, had been sighted in a Baghdad suburb.
The ex-Pentagon official said the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency asked the Bundesnachrichtendienst (BND), Germany's foreign spy service, to send one of its Baghdad agents to the suburb of Mansur to check the tip. After he confirmed the presence of the convoy, the report said, a U.S. plane dropped four bombs on the target area, killing at least 12 civilians, according to the report.
A BND spokesman confirmed the presence of two German intelligence agents in Iraq before and during the U.S.-led invasion. But he said the report, also published in the newspaper Sueddeutsche Zeitung, was "false and distorted".
"Contrary to allegations ... we have to record for our part that no target data or bombing coordinates were made available to the parties conducting the war," the spokesman said.
FOREIGN MINISTER UNDER PRESSURE
The report threatened to embarrass Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier, who as chief of staff to Schroeder had oversight of the security services at the time. Asked if the Schroeder government knew of any BND support for the U.S.-led war, Steinmeier told reporters simply: "No". Schroeder was elected to a second term in 2002 on a platform of strong opposition to the looming war in Iraq, declaring that Germany would not take part in any military "adventure" there.
The new report surfaced on the day his successor Angela Merkel, was heading to Washington to meet President George W. Bush for the first time since taking office last November. Her conservatives were in opposition at the time of the war and Merkel now heads a coalition with Schroeder's Social Democrats.
A German security source, speaking on condition of anonymity, acknowledged the BND had shared information with the United States during the bombing phase of the war, but only to identify "non-targets" such as embassies, schools and hospitals in order to spare them from being hit. He said other countries' agents had done the same, mindful of the mistaken targeting of the Chinese embassy in Belgrade during NATO's bombing of Serbia in 1999.
Opposition Greens parliamentary leader Renate Kuenast said German help in U.S. bombing raids would be a "monstrous action".
The report fuelled pressure which has been building on the government for weeks to allow an inquiry into the role of Germany's security services in the U.S.-led war on terrorism.
The government confirmed for the first time last month that German security officials had questioned detainees at the U.S. prison camp in Guantanamo Bay in Cuba and had also interviewed a a German-Syrian terrorist suspect in a Syrian prison in 2002. The latter meeting took place at a time when the government had told the man's lawyer it had no idea of his whereabouts and had no access to him.
Steinmeier was also forced last month to defend the Schroeder government's handling of the case of Khaled el-Masri, a German citizen who was held by the United States for five months in an Afghan prison before being released in May 2004. - alertnet.org

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 10
SAMARRA - Two insurgents were killed on Monday in Samarra, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, when a bomb they were trying to plant at the side of a road exploded prematurely, the U.S. military said.
NEAR SAMARRA - U.S. soldiers shot dead one gunman and arrested another on Monday after they had opened fire on a U.S. patrol, the American military said.
NEAR BALAD - U.S. soldiers killed a gunman on Monday after he shot at them from a building near Balad, 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. They said they found bomb-making equipment in the building. - alertnet

supposedly Left-wing Zapatero's Spain still
asserting Al Queda cells
to help justify EU / US terror swoops

Spain arrests 20 alleged Islamist militants
By Elizabeth Fullerton MADRID, Jan 10 (Reuters) - Spain on Tuesday arrested 20 people suspected of recruiting Islamist fighters for Iraq, and said one of the recruits had killed 19 Italians in a suicide bombing in Iraq in 2003.
Interior Minister Jose Antonio Alonso said it was possible that the alleged militants arrested in the overnight operation may have planned "violent actions" in Europe, although there was no evidence of any imminent attack in Spain.
Police broke up two alleged al Qaeda-linked cells in raids in the Madrid and Barcelona areas and the Basque country, arresting 15 Moroccans, three Spaniards, one Turk and one Algerian, Alonso told a news conference.
Alonso said their mission was to recruit and provide financial and logistical support to fighters sent to Iraq. They had connections in France, Belgium, the Netherlands, Algeria, Morocco, Turkey, Syria and Iraq.
The Interior Ministry said it had proven the Barcelona-area cell was responsible for recruiting an Algerian suicide bomber who killed 19 Italians and nine Iraqis in an attack on an Italian police base in southern Iraq in November 2003.
Laboratories run by Spanish and Italian security forces had worked together to prove this link, it said in a statement. The Nassiriya attack was the deadliest on Italian forces since World War Two and caused deep shock in Italy.
Last month, Spain arrested 16 people accused of recruiting Islamist militants and a further two gave themselves up. A judge jailed six of them on suspicion of recruiting people to send as suicide bombers or insurgents to Iraq, Chechnya or Kashmir. The other 12 were released pending further investigation. That investigation focused on a mosque in the southern Spanish city of Malaga that Spanish officials said was frequented by people with radical Islamist beliefs.
Tuesday's raids were the latest in a series of operations against suspected Islamist militants in Spain since the al Qaeda-linked Madrid train bombings that killed 191 people on March 11, 2004. (Additional reporting by Blanca Rodriguez, Emma Ross-Thomas) reuters

A Berm? a wall of sand to protect the OIL, intimidates people

U.S. troops build wall of sand around Iraqi town
By Ghazwan al-Jibouri SINIYA, Iraq, Jan 10 (Reuters) - U.S. soldiers fed up with almost daily bomb attacks on their patrols near Iraq's main oil refinery are taking drastic measures to fight their shadowy enemy -- they're walling in an entire town.
Army bulldozers have begun building giant sand embankments around Siniya, a town of 50,000 close to the northern oil refining city of Baiji. When finished it will be 10 km (6 miles) long and more than 2 metres (nearly 8 feet) high.
The U.S. army says it is to keep insurgents out and that it is being built with the agreement of local police, town council members and religious leaders, who complain that Siniya is being used as a safe haven by insurgents. But some angry residents, including the head of the city council, complain it appears designed to keep residents in.
"We oppose the building of this wall because it makes the city looks like a detention centre," said Nima al-Kawaz, the head of the city council.
The U.S. military hopes to repeat the success of a similar berm or sand wall that was built in August around Samarra, 100 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, to stop insurgents from entering the city. It says violence there has since dropped off sharply.
Similar barriers have been built elsewhere in Iraq.
"I think this wall is good because it will prevent the terrorists from entering the city (Siniya). This is being done with the agreement of the sheikhs of the tribes, city council and police," U.S. Captain Christopher Judge, who is overseeing construction of the wall, told Reuters.
Siniya is about 15 km (10 miles) west of Baiji, home to Iraq's main refinery. Soldiers of the 101st Airborne Division patrol the area.
CHANGE IN TACTICS
U.S. and Iraqi forces are subjected to almost daily roadside bomb attacks around Baiji, 180 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad. One of the counter-insurgency tactics which the U.S. military has employed is to use reconnaissance drones, which hover in the air hunting for insurgents digging holes in the road to plant improvised explosive devices. On several occasions U.S. troops have called in air strikes, but these have angered Sunni Arab leaders who say innocent civilians have been killed in the attacks. Last week, an air strike on a Baiji house killed seven members of an Iraqi family. The U.S. military said aircraft bombed the building when three men were spotted going into it after digging a hole that troops suspected was for a bomb.
Iraqi and U.S. soldiers began building the berm around Siniya on Jan. 5 and it is expected to be completed in days. Iraqi security forces will man the access points into the village as well as guard towers along the wall.
The U.S. army said in a statement that the wall would prevent insurgents using the village as a base.
"As Siniya's community leaders have long insisted, those responsible for the violence were outsiders, not residents of the village," the statement said.
But Rafid Abbas, 25, who drives a fuel truck, said the barrier and checkpoints would strangle the town: "The wall hinders vehicle movement greatly," he told Reuters.
His comments echoed those of residents in Samarra, some of whom have complained that the berm around their city has devastated business and driven out thousands of people.
One Siniya resident was pessimistic that the wall would help flush out insurgents as the U.S. military hopes: "I think the U.S forces will conduct a strike after finding out that the wall is not useful," said Saleh Hussein, 44. reuters

Iraqi politician says Shiites won't accept changes to constitution
BAGHDAD (AP) - The most influential politician in Iraq issued a veiled warning Wednesday to Sunni Arabs that Shiites would not allow substantive amendments to the country's new constitution, including to the provision that keeps the central government weak in favor of strong provincial governments.
Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, the leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, said in an address in honor of the Islamic holiday of Eid al-Adha that provincial governments will remain strong in the constitution, which can be amended after the next government is installed.
"The first principle is not to change the essence of the constitution. This constitution was endorsed by the Iraqi people," he said.
Sunni Arabs place great stock in their ability to change the constitution, one of the reasons Sunni politician urged the minority to turn out in large numbers during the Dec. 15 parliamentary election. They want a stronger central government because the constitution now bestows most power — including control over oil profits — to provincial governments. The Shiites in the south and the Kurds in the north control most of Iraq's oil. There are few oil reserves in central Iraq, where Sunnis live.
To win their support for the new constitution, which was approved in an Oct. 15 vote, Sunni Arabs were promised they could propose amendments to it during the first four months of the new parliament's tenure. The new parliament is expected to be seated around the end of February. Amendments need two-thirds approval in parliament and a majority in a national referendum.
There was limited violence Wednesday. A roadside bomb exploded next to a police patrol outside Samarra, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, killing two policemen, police Capt. Laith Mohammed said. Iraqi police found seven bodies shot in the head, their legs and hands bound, in a sewer in eastern Baghdad, 1st Lt. Mohammed Khayon said.
Meanwhile, health officials in northern Iraq, which shares a border with Turkey, have started taking measures to prevent possible cases of bird flu from entering the country. Preliminary tests have shown that at least 15 people in Turkey have been infected with the deadly H5N1 strain of the flu. Two children have died. Doctors, veterinarians and other health ministry officials met Sunday in northern Iraq's Kurdish enclave to discuss bird flu, the region's minister of agriculture said Wednesday.
"A campaign will start on the borders of Turkey and Iran to prevent the importation of any kind of bird," Shamal Abid Waffal said. "No living birds are allowed to be sold in the markets. Even the frozen birds are not allowed to be taken from one city to another without medical tests."
There have been no reported cases of bird flu in Iraq.
Iraqis nationwide celebrated the opening of the four-day Eid al-Adha celebration on Tuesday with visits to relatives, food and sweets. Lambs were slaughtered and food was distributed to the poor.
Eid al-Adha — one of Iraq's biggest holidays — concludes the pilgrimage to Mecca and is celebrated by Muslims worldwide. It commemorates Abraham's readiness to sacrifice his son in God's test of the patriarch's faith. At the last moment, God substituted a sheep for the son. The story is shared by all the great monotheistic religions — Islam, Judaism and Christianity.
Shiites and Sunni Arabs also called for an end to the bloodshed that has wracked Iraq since last month's elections. "This Eid is a happy day for all Muslims, especially Iraqis. But it comes after painful events that happened in Karbala and Ramadi," said Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari, a Shiite.
He referred to the killings of more than 120 people in suicide bombings last week in the Shiite holy city of Karbala and at a police recruiting center in Ramadi. On Monday, suicide bombers infiltrated the heavily fortified Interior Ministry compound in Baghdad and killed 29 Iraqis — an attack claimed by al-Qaeda in Iraq, a group with an avowed aim of starting a sectarian war.
Violence has increased since the Dec. 15 elections, with at least 498 Iraqis and 54 U.S. forces killed.
Al-Jaafari said despite the violence, Iraq had made significant advances in 2005, citing a large turnout in Dec. 15 elections as one of the biggest achievements.
About 70% of Iraq's 15 million voters, including large numbers of Sunni Arabs, participated in the elections, although some Sunni Arab groups complained the vote was tainted by fraud — delaying the release of results.
Al-Jaafari's governing United Iraqi Alliance emerged with a large lead in the elections, far ahead of a Kurdish coalition and Sunni Arab groups but without the majority it will need in the 275-member parliament to avoid a coalition.
With final results expected next week, the Shiites, Kurds and some Sunni Arab groups have been talking about forming a broad-based coalition government.
Al-Hakim, the leader of the United Iraqi Alliance, urged Sunni Arabs on Tuesday to stop complaining and accept the results.
In Washington, President Bush, speaking at a gathering of the Veterans of Foreign Wars, also urged Iraqis to put aside their differences to form a government of national unity, warning that the country "risks sliding back into tyranny" if it dwells on old grievances. - usatoday.com

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 12
BAGHDAD - U.S. soldiers killed six insurgents and wounded one in clashes in Baghdad on Wednesday, the U.S. military said. They said two of the dead were wearing suicide vests packed with explosives. They also found bomb-making equipment, assault rifles and ammunition in a nearby shack.
NEAR TIKRIT - Iraqi soldiers freed two kidnapped Iraqis on Wednesday near Tikrit, 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. The captives were found bound and gagged in the boot of a car during an Iraqi army patrol.
*BAGHDAD - Iraqi and U.S. soldiers detained a man after a firefight with insurgents and discovered a weapons cache that included 50 AK-47 rifles, 10 rocket launchers and 200 grenades, the U.S. military said in a statement.
*TIKRIT - U.S. forces discovered three weapons caches and detained 21 suspected insurgents during raids in Tal Afar, Tikrit and Mosul in northern Iraq on Wednesday, the U.S. military said in a statement. - alertnet.org

Insurgents shoot down U.S. helicopter in Iraq
By Nabeel Norddin MOSUL, Jan 13 (Reuters) - Insurgents shot down a U.S. military helicopter near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Friday, witnesses and U.S. officials said.
It was not immediately clear whether there were any survivors.
Witnesses reported seeing gunmen armed with heavy machineguns open fire on the OH-58 Kiowa Warrior, a two-seat, single-engine helicopter, in al-Sukar district north of Mosul, about 240 miles (390 km) north of Baghdad.
"The indicators are that it was due to hostile fire," army Lieutenant-General John Vines, the No. 2 U.S. commander in Iraq, confirmed to reporters at the Pentagon from Baghdad.
A Reuters cameraman in al-Sukar said U.S. forces swiftly sealed off the area after the crash. The helicopter was completed destroyed and wreckage was strewn about.
It was the second U.S. helicopter to crash in Iraq in less than a week. A military UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter crashed on Saturday, killing all 12 aboard in one of the worst incidents of its kind since the war began in 2003.
The U.S. military believes the Black Hawk may have been brought down by bad weather, but the cause is still under investigation.
Dozens of soldiers have been killed in helicopter crashes since the U.S.-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003, some in accidents and some after being fired on by insurgents with shoulder-fired missiles or small arms.
Faced with dangerous roads and vast tracts of desert, the military uses helicopters as its main means of transport, carrying troops and supplies between bases dotted around the country. - alertnet.org

Official: Iraqi Election Results Delayed
By SAMEER N. YACOUB, Associated Press - 14th Jan 2006 - BAGHDAD, Iraq - Iraq's electoral commission won't release final results from last month's election in coming days because the panel is waiting on international monitors to finish investigating fraud complaints, a senior Iraqi election official said Saturday.
"It is impossible to have the final election results this week," Safwat Rashid, a senior member of the Independent Electoral Commission of Iraq told The Associated Press. He was referring to the Islamic week, which began Friday and ends on Thursday.
A senior official with an international team assessing the results at the request of the IEIC said the group won't issue its own findings for at least another week. There had been hopes that delays could be overcome and that the final results would be released in the next days.
The leader of the main Sunni Arab Iraqi Accordance Front, however, said waiting for the international team's findings was a logical decision that could boost the credibility of the outcome. "If the results were announced without the review by the international committee, the results would not be accurate or in accordance with the votes that were actually cast," said Adnan al-Dulaimi.
Monitors from the International Mission for Iraqi Elections arrived at the beginning of January after Sunni Arab and Shiite secular parties alleged widespread fraud and intimidation in the Dec. 15 parliamentary elections. The parties had demanded a rerun of the elections in some provinces, including Baghdad, the largest with 59 of the parliament's 275-seats.
Preliminary results gave the governing United Iraqi Alliance, a Shiite religious bloc, a strong lead. But it won't win enough seats in the 275-member parliament to avoid forming a coalition with Sunni Arab and Kurdish parties. Although leading politicians have expressed hopes a government could be formed in February, most experts and officials agree it could take two to three months, as it did after the January 2005 elections for an interim government.
In violence, insurgents apparently shot down a U.S. Army reconnaissance helicopter in the northern city of Mosul on Friday, killing its two pilots, in the second fatal helicopter crash in Iraq in less than a week. One witness said he heard machine-gun fire before the helicopter crashed Friday, and children told soldiers that the sound of gunfire came from three or four directions and that the helicopter was flying erratically, possibly trying to evade it. The helicopter's two pilots - the only people aboard - were killed. The crash came as Lt. Gen. John Vines, chief of the Multi-National Corps Iraq, predicted increased attacks around Iraq when final election results are released. At least 500 people and more than 50 U.S. troops have been killed since the Dec. 15 elections.
Kamal al-Saadi, a senior official in Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari's Dawa party, said the decision to delay the announcement may mean election officials want to be "more accurate in the process." "I have no problem with a delay of another week. It's already been delayed a month and one week will not make any difference," he said. "We understand that the people want to have the results as soon as possible, but this delay is not our doing and we respect the work of the (electoral) committee."
About 1,500 complaints have been filed, including about 50 thought to be serious enough to affect the results at some of the more than 30,000 polling stations set up in the country of 27 million. The monitoring team includes two executive representatives from the League of Arab States, one executive member of the Canadian Association of Former Parliamentarians and a respected European academic, the group has said.
Mazin Shuaib, executive manager of the international team, said the group would present a preliminary report within days but the final report would not be ready until after Jan. 22. "The work is still going on and we are still discussing all the information that we collected from all sides, electoral commission, international monitors and other (political) parties," Shuaib told the AP. "We are not facing any problem in our mission and all sides are cooperating."
Rashid said the electoral commission would study the international team's findings and give political parties two days to submit any complaints. He said it could take up to two weeks to assess complaints. Associated Press reporters Qassim Abdul-Zahra, Sinan Salaheddin, and Bushra Juhi in Baghdad contributed to this report. - news.yahoo.com

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 14
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed two policemen and wounded four other people when it blew up next to a police patrol in eastern Baghdad, police said.
RAMADI - Gunmen killed Sunni cleric Abdul-Ghafour al-Rawi, a member of the influential Muslim Scholars' Association, just west of the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi as he headed to a local mosque to lead prayers, witnesses said.
BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed Hadi al-Wa'ili, a Shi'ite cleric who led prayers at the Mehdi mosque in the mixed Baghdad neighbourhood of Hurriya, police said.
RAMADI - A U.S. Marine died of gunshot wounds sustained in combat on Friday in Ramadi, the U.S. military said in a statement.
* HILLA - One Iraqi civilian was killed and two wounded when a roadside bomb targeting a U.S. convoy exploded on a main road east of the Shi'ite city of Hilla, police said. - alertnet.org

er...this is really dodgy: why no ransom?
US silencing journalists at precipitous times, then pretending to rescue them?

British journalist reveals Iraq kidnap escape
BAGHDAD (AFP) - A British journalist has revealed his lucky escape from kidnappers in Iraq thanks to a chance raid by US troops, following an abduction that went unnoticed by British and Iraqi authorities.
The bizarre story emerged as officials acknowledged final results from December elections might only be known at the end of the month, with hopes pinned on the swift formation of a new government to dampen the insurgency. Gunmen snatched Phil Sands, 28, on December 26 in Baghdad as he travelled with a local driver and interpreter, the journalist's newspaper Emirates Today said in a front-page article two weeks after his release. Sands was freed five days later when the US military by chance stormed the hideout where he was being held, diplomatic and military officials told AFP.
In an unusual twist, neither the British embassy in Baghdad nor the Iraqi authorities had been aware of the kidnapping until his release, an embassy spokesman said. The military handed the man over to the embassy following a 3 am raid.
"We looked after him, gave him a medical check-up and then saw him safely out of Iraq," the embassy spokesman said.
Speaking of the ordeal from Dubai, Sands said he was taken hostage to apply political pressure on Britain to pull its troops out of Iraq. He was forced at one point to record a video message urging the British people to remove Prime Minister Tony Blair from office.
"My captors did not beat me or treat me badly. They saw me as a political tool and that is why they made me make a video," Sands told his newspaper, noting that the US soldiers found him blindfolded and handcuffed. His driver and interpreter were also found by US forces at the hide-out.
The UAE newspaper declined to offer an explanation for the two-week delay in announcing the release, but sources said he was being questioned by the US and British military during that period.
A wave of kidnappings of foreigners and Iraqis has added to the insecurity that has plagued Iraq in the aftermath of the US-led invasion in March 2003. One week after an American reporter was seized by gunmen in Baghdad, there is still no news on the fate of Jill Carroll, 28, a freelancer for the Christian Science Monitor newspaper. But Iraqi and US officials hope the outcome of parliamentary elections a month ago will lead to the creation of a unified government that will undermine the Sunni-backed insurgency and bring stability to the country.
The final certified results of the December 15 poll, however, might only be known at the end of January because of an appeals period and other technical matters, an election official said Saturday. Initial indications from the ballot showed that Iraq's Shiite majority came out on top, but final results have been delayed by a probe into complaints by Sunni-backed and secular parties of election fraud.
Iraq's electoral commission said it will release the findings of its investigation into the allegations by Tuesday, after a team of foreign monitors announces the initial results of its own probe on Sunday. One or two days later, the commission will reveal final but uncertified results of the election, Iraq's first for a permanent parliament since the fall of Saddam Hussein, said electoral commission member Safwat Rashid. A period for appeals and the consideration of the appeals will follow before the final certified results are released, Rishad explained.
Away from the politics, the bloodshed continued. A US marine shot Friday in western Iraq died of his wounds, the US military said Saturday. North of the capital a Shiite Imam was shot said, a security source said. In the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, a guard to the chief of police of Kirkuk was killed by sniper in front of his house, said a police captain. And in Baghdad, two policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb hit their patrol as it travelled through Al-Meshtal neighbourhood in the south east of the city. - ews.yahoo.com

ahem!

U.S. military frees two Reuters journalists in Iraq
BAGHDAD, Jan 15 (Reuters) - The U.S. military freed two Iraqi journalists who work for Reuters on Sunday after holding them for several months without charge.
Ali al-Mashhadani, a television cameraman who was arrested in August, and Majed Hameed, a correspondent for Reuters and Arabiya television who was detained in September, are both based in Ramadi, one of the centres of a Sunni Arab insurgency.
They were freed from Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison after being held there and at Camp Bucca, a U.S. jail in southern Iraq.
At least three other Iraqi journalists for international media, including a freelance cameraman working for Reuters in the northern town of Tal Afar, remain in custody. Reuters has urged the U.S. military also to free Samir Mohammed Noor, who has been held without charge since his arrest by Iraqi troops at his home in Tal Afar seven months ago. A cameraman for U.S. television network CBS in Mosul has been held since April.
"We are delighted that Ali and Majed are now free although we continue to have grave doubts about the way in which they were held for so long without charge," Reuters Global Managing Editor David Schlesinger said. "We hope that Samir will also be able to rejoin his family soon."
Reuters and international media rights groups have repeatedly voiced concern at the long and unexplained detentions of journalists by U.S. troops. They have in particular criticised the military's refusal to deal more quickly with suspicions apparently arising from reporters' legitimate activities in covering the insurgency.
More than 14,000 people, mostly Sunni Arabs, are held by the U.S. military on suspicion of taking part in Iraq's insurgency. - alertnet.org

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 15
MAHAWIL - A body, gagged and bound and shot dead, was found in Mahawil, 75 km (50 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
TUZ KHURMATU - Four policemen were seriously wounded when a makeshift bomb went off near their patrol in Tuz Khurmatu, north of Baghdad, the local authority said.
BALAD - An Iraqi soldier was killed and another wounded on Saturday when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in the city of Balad, 90 km (55 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
BAIJI - Gunmen shot dead a police colonel on Saturday in the oil refinery city of Baiji, the local authorities said.
alertnet.org

US helicopter crashes north of Baghdad
16/01/2006 - A helicopter went down north of Baghdad today, but the status of the two-man crew wasn't immediately known, the US military said.
It was not immediately known what caused the helicopter to crash at about 8.20am local time, and the military didn't release any additional information.
Among the helicopters used by the Army that have a two-person crew are the AH-64 Apache and the OH-58 Kiowa reconnaissance.
The number of fatal US military helicopter crashes in Iraq has increased in recent weeks, fitting a wartime pattern of more frequent accidental and combat crashes during winter months.
An OH-58 Kiowa Warrior reconnaissance helicopter crashed near Mosul on Friday, killing two pilots.
Earlier this month, a Black Hawk with 12 aboard crashed in bad weather near the northern city of Tal Afar. All eight soldiers and four civilians aboard were killed. Weather has not been officially declared the cause.
The overall safety record of Army and Marine Corps helicopters has been good, military officials and private analysts say, given the enormous amount of flying in often-harsh conditions.
Army helicopters alone have logged nearly 1 million flight hours since the conflict began, with the UH-60 Black Hawk accounting for nearly one-third of the total, according to Army Aviation Warfighting Centre records.
A total of seven Black Hawks have crashed. The second-most heavily used Army helicopter, the AH-64 Apache, has crashed four times an the No.3 helicopter, the Kiowa Warrior, has gone down seven times. Some were accidents, others were caused by hostile fire and some are still under investigation.
Of the 15 most recent fatal crashes, nine were during winter months. The deadliest was on January 26 last year when all 31 Marines aboard a CH-53 Sea Stallion transport crashed in bad weather in the western desert. - IOL

Iraq says Iran seized coastguards, Tehran denies
By Alastair Macdonald BAGHDAD, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Iraqi officials accused Iranian forces of "kidnapping" a coastguard patrol after a clash on their tidal frontier and demanded the men's release on Tuesday. Iranian foreign ministry staff initially flatly denied reports that the Islamic Republic's forces had seized the men, but later said a fight between an Iranian cargo ship and an Iraqi patrol was "under investigation".
The affair is a test of the new warmth in relations between Baghdad and Tehran since pro-Iranian Shi'ites took control in Iraq after U.S. forces overthrew Saddam Hussein.
Iraqi President Jalal Talabani stepped in to cool tempers, conceding the nine Iraqis might have strayed across the border in the shifting tidal shoals of the Shatt al-Arab and calling their arrest a "mistake" that would soon be sorted out.
Earlier, Iraq's foreign minister called in the Iranian envoy to seek the release of nine coast guards Iraq said were seized after an exchange of fire involving suspected oil smugglers on their long-disputed and poorly defined border along the estuary. But Iran's Baghdad embassy denied knowledge of the incident, which Iraqi officials said happened on Saturday or Sunday. The regional governor in Basra accused the Iranians of "martyring" one Iraqi and "kidnapping" eight but said later he had been unable to confirm the death: "He has serious injuries and there are reports that he has died, but I have not been able to verify that," Mohammed al-Waili told Al Arabiya television. The central government in Baghdad was more restrained and a government spokeswoman said she did not know of any casualty. Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari raised the issue in a meeting with Iranian charge d'affaires Hasan Kazemi-Qomi, an Iraqi Foreign Ministry spokesman said.
But Kazemi-Qomi said through a spokeswoman: "The reports of this incident are untrue." He made no further comment.
The Iranian Foreign Ministry in Tehran agreed the reports were "incorrect". However Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid Reza Asefi later told agencies a clash had taken place. "The cause of a fight between a cargo ship and Iraqi patrolling forces is under investigation," he was quoted as saying by three Iranian news agencies.
Asefi was not immediately available to comment.
"MISTAKE"
Talabani, a Kurd, told Reuters: "Perhaps this happened ... as a mistake. I don't think it was a plan for capturing Iraqis. "Perhaps they violated the border ... Otherwise I don't think there is anything behind these arrests ... I am expecting there will be releases very soon and they'll come back home."
Waili told Reuters the Iraqi coastguards had boarded an Iranian-skippered ship suspected of smuggling oil in Iraqi waters when they were overpowered by an Iranian patrol.
Iraq and Iran have a long history of disputes along the Shatt al-Arab. Iran briefly seized three British naval patrol boats in the same area in June 2004, at a time when U.S.-led occupation forces were responsible for policing the border. But relations between Baghdad and Tehran are at their warmest in decades, with Shi'ite leaders in power in Iraq since the fall of Saddam's Sunni Arab-dominated government. Many of the new leaders sought refuge in Shi'ite Iran during the bloody 1980-88 war Saddam fought against Tehran, in part triggered by disputes over the river and maritime frontier.
The present government's close ties with Iran have alarmed the United States, which is at daggers drawn with Tehran, most recently over accusations it is developing nuclear weapons. Lieutenant Colonel Ziyad Majid Wali, a Coast Guard commander in the Iraqi port of Abu Flous, told Reuters the problem began when a patrol approached the ship, the Nour 1, suspecting it smuggling oil near Abadan, on the Iranian side of the waterway. Smuggling is a major problem for the Iraqi government, which heavily subsidises fuel and sees some of it driven or shipped abroad to be sold for big profits in neighbouring countries. (Additional reporting by Abdel-Razzak Hameed in Abu Flous and Ross Colvin, Aseel Kami and Michael Georgy in Baghdad) - alertnet.org

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 16
MUSAIB - Three civilians were wounded when a roadside bomb targeting an Iraqi police patrol exploded in Musaib, south of Baghdad, police said.
ISKANDARIYA - Iraqi police arrested three insurgents while they were planting bombs on a road near Iraqi police on Sunday in Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
RAMADI - Gunmen shot dead tribal leader Nesir Abdul Kareem while he was driving his car in the city of Ramadi, 110 km (68 miles) west of Baghdad, police said. - alertnet.org

War cost could reach $2 trillion
WASHINGTON — The cost of the Iraq War for U.S. taxpayers is likely to be between $1 and $2 trillion, up to 10 times more than previously thought, a Nobel prize-winning economist has said. According to the UK Guardian, which interviewed Columbia University professor Joseph Stiglitz about his study, the findings are likely to add to the pressure on the White House, which recently announced that it is scaling back ambitions to rebuild Iraq.
Co-authored by Stiglitz and Harvard budget expert Linda Bilmes, the study expanded on traditional estimates by including such costs as lifetime disability and health care for troops injured in the conflict, as well as the impact on the U.S. economy. Their conclusion: The government continues to underestimate the cost of the war.
Stiglitz told the Guardian that despite the staggering costs outlined in his paper, "our estimates are very conservative, and it could be that the final costs will be much higher. And it should be noted they do not include the costs of the conflict to either Iraq or the UK." - Vermont Guardian

23 Iraqis killed, thirty five police recruits feared dead
Friday 20th January, 2006 - Two bombs exploded moments apart killing 23 people in downtown Baghdad, and 35 kidnapped police recruits are also feared dead.
Meanwhile, Arab satellite channel Al Jazeera showed new tape of kidnapped reporter Jill Carroll, as her family and colleagues appealed for her release. The video shows kidnapped Carroll flanked by armed and masked men. Al Jazeera told The Associated Press that the footage was from the same tape broadcast Tuesday, which showed Carroll seated in front of a white wall, talking to the camera. The new tape aired the same day Christian Science Monitor Washington Bureau Chief David Cook appealed for Carroll's release.
"It would be wrong to murder someone who has devoted herself unselfishly to promoting understanding of the Iraqi people," he said.
Several high-level Sunni clerics and political leaders in Iraq and around the Arab world have also called for Carroll's release. Her kidnappers demand that all female detainees be released by Iraqi and U.S. forces or Carroll will be killed Friday.
The U.S. military says it holds only eight female prisoners, and that those detainees will be processed according to normal procedures.
Carroll was kidnapped and her translator shot dead on January 7 in a lawless neighborhood on the city's largely Sunni west side.
Violence continued in central Baghdad, as two bombs blew up on a busy commercial strip. In the first incident, a suicide bomber walked into a coffee shop and detonated his explosive vest, sending body parts and bloodied furniture flying onto the street. Almost simultaneously, a nearby bomb exploded near a popular restaurant.
Meanwhile, 35 police applicants missing since Monday are all probably dead, the U.S. military says. The men had been returning to the northern Iraqi town of Samarra from Baghdad, after failing to be admitted to the Baghdad police academy.
U.S. Army Lieutenant Colonel Frederick Wellman says the men got caught in an insurgent checkpoint as their public bus took a detour on their way back home.
"Insurgents stopped the bus, and while searching the bus discovered the men were police recruits, they separated them from the other civilians on the bus, then took those men and the bus and departed the area," he said.
Wellman said based on reports he received, there was reason to believe the applicants were executed. - bignewsnetwork

Iraq vote results give Shi'ites close to majority
BAGHDAD, Jan 20 (Reuters) - Final results of Iraq's Dec. 15 election gave the Shi'ite Islamist Alliance 128 seats, 10 short of a majority in the 275-seat chamber, an Electoral Commission official told a news conference on Friday.
The results, in line with expectations and earlier counts, gave the Kurdish bloc 53 seats and former prime minister Iyad Allawi's secular list 25, with two main Sunni Arab groups, the Accordance Front and the National Dialogue Front, securing 44 and 11 places respectively, Safwat Rasheed said.
Parties have two days to appeal before the results are certified as definitive.
Some Sunni Arab and secular parties have complained of vote -rigging in the poll, but international monitors brought in to address the complaints gave the election process a mostly clean bill of health in a report on Thursday, clearing the way for the results to be released.
Many Sunni leaders are already discussing places in a new coalition government.
The results were released amid tight security -- police blocked off roads between Baghdad and the restive provinces of Anbar, Salahaddin and Diyala, heartlands of Sunni Arab rebels. - reuters

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 20
BAGHDAD - Two civilians were killed and three wounded when a roadside bomb targeting a U.S. patrol exploded in Baghdad's Karada district, police said.
*NEAR DUJAIL - Iraqi security forces said they had found the bodies of seven civilians just east of the village of Dujail, in an area where 35 police recruits were abducted on Tuesday.
*MIQDADIA - One policeman was killed and four wounded when their patrol was struck by a roadside bomb in the town of Miqdadia, north of Baghdad. Police said earlier that five policemen were wounded in the attack.
*BAGHDAD - Seven people were wounded, including four policemen, when a car bomb targeting a police patrol exploded in northern Baghdad, police said.
*BAGHDAD - Police said a U.S. patrol was struck by a roadside bomb in southern Baghdad, but there were no reports of injuries. There was no immediate comment from the U.S. military.
*KERBALA - A police commando was shot dead by gunmen while he was leaving his house in Kerbala, 110 km (68 miles) southwest of Baghdad, police said.
*KERBALA - Abdoun Hmood, a former Baath Party member, was found shot dead in a playground in Shi'ite Kerbala. Police said they found him blindfolded and with his hands bound.
MUSSAYIB - Police said they had detained five insurgents trying to launch rockets in the town of Mussayib, near Kerbala. - reuters

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 21
* BAGHDAD - Two U.S. Marines were killed in a suicide bomb attack during combat operations in Haqlaniya, western Iraq, on Friday, the U.S. military said in a statement.
BAGHDAD - A U.S. helicopter made a precautionary landing in northern Baghdad late on Friday. The crew were unhurt and the aircraft was transported to a U.S. base, a military spokesman said.
TUZ KHURMATU - A roadside bomb struck the motorcade carrying members of President Jalal Talabani's staff, wounding five people in Tuz Khurmatu 60 km (40 miles) south of the oil city of Kirkuk on Friday. Talabani was not present.
Police said one person was killed when a bomb exploded near a passing car on Saturday.
TIKRIT - Gunmen opened fire on an army major as he drove to his office in the city of Tikrit 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, killing him, his son and his driver, Tikrit police said.
BAGHDAD - One person was killed and two seriously wounded when a car bomb exploded near a crowded market in Baghdad, police said.
DUJEIL - Gunmen killed an engineer working in a U.S. military base in Dujeil 50 km (32 miles) north of Baghdad as he drove out of the facility, Dujeil police said.
DOUR - One person was killed and two wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their car in Dour 25 km (16 miles) east of Tikrit, police said.
BAGHDAD - One policeman was killed and another wounded when a roadside bomb struck their patrol in the al-Rasheed area 35 km (20 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
BAQUBA - Two policemen were killed and six wounded when a car bomb exploded near their patrol in Baquba 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said. - reuters

Revenge Brigades reported in WSWS:
The kidnapping and threatened execution of American journalist Jill Carroll is a reactionary act that will do nothing to advance the struggle against the American occupation of Iraq. Information on the nature of the organization that has kidnapped Carroll is extremely murky. Little is known about the Revenge Brigade's origins, and there remains the possibility that it has some ties to occupation forces. What can be said is that the kidnapping and possible execution of Carroll will only play into the hands of the US military. It will be used in an attempt to disorient the American people and divert mounting opposition to the policies of the government, both abroad and within the United States.
see also Break 4 News report

Third Reuters Iraq journalist freed by US troops
Sun Jan 22, 5:06 AM ET BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The U.S. military freed an Iraqi journalist who works for Reuters on Sunday after holding him for nearly eight months without charge.
Samir Mohammed Noor was the third journalist working for Reuters to be freed from military custody after two others were released a week ago. At least two journalists for other international media organizations are still being held. Noor, a 30-year-old freelance television cameraman, spent time in Baghdad's Abu Ghraib prison and lately at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq; he was arrested at his home in the violent northern city of Tal Afar in early June during a general search of his neighborhood by Iraqi and U.S. troops.
"We are glad that all journalists working for Reuters in Iraq are now free," said Reuters Global Managing Editor David Schlesinger. "We are concerned, however, that it has taken so long -- nearly eight months in the case of Samir -- to secure their release, despite a lack of credible evidence against them."
Two Reuters journalists from the restive western city of Ramadi, cameraman Ali al-Mashhadani and reporter Majed Hameed, who also works for Al-Arabiya television, were freed on January 15 after five and four months in custody respectively. Among those still being held is a cameraman from the northern city of Mosul who works for the U.S. television network CBS. He has been held since April.
Reuters and international media rights groups have repeatedly voiced concern at long U.S. detentions of journalists without legal process. They have in particular criticized the military's refusal to deal more quickly with suspicions arising from the reporters' legitimate journalistic activities covering the insurgency.
Reuters is gathering information from the three released journalists to learn more about the circumstances of their arrests and detention.
Schlesinger said: "Nothing we have heard so far from either the U.S. military or our colleagues indicates that suspicions were raised against them for any other reason than their courageous and honest pursuit of professional journalism." - news.yahoo.com

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 22
MAHAWEEL - Iraqi police said they found the bodies of four people bound, blindfolded and shot dead, in Mahaweel, south of Baghdad. On Saturday they found two bodies in similar circumstances.
MOSUL - Four Iraqi policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in the northern city of Mosul, police said.
BAIJI - U.S. soldiers shot dead three men in the northern town of Baiji. The U.S. military said they were insurgents who had shot at a patrol, but Iraqi police said they were innocent civilians who had been driving by when the patrol opened fired after being struck by a roadside bomb.
BALADRUZ - Insurgents fired rockets at a policeman's house in Baladruz, a town 65 km (45 miles) northeast of Baghdad, killing his brother and four young nephews, police said.
BAQUBA - Four policemen were killed and nine wounded when a roadside bomb hit their patrol in the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
*NEAR SAMARRA - Police discovered the bodies of 23 police recruits who were part of a group of 35 who were killed after being ambushed in a rebel area north of Baghdad last week, said Colonel Mohsen Jassim, chief of police of Salaheddine province. The 12 other bodies were found last week. One policeman survived the attack.
HAWIJA - Three policemen were wounded when a roadside bomb went off near their patrol in Hawija, southwest of the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said.
MINZILA - Ibrahim Ali al-Nuiemei, a tribal leader, and his son were found shot dead several hours after being kidnapped in the village of Minzila just south of Kirkuk, police said.
HAQLANIYA - Two U.S. Marines were killed on Friday in Haqlaniya, 250 km (150 miles) west of Baghdad, in a suicide car bombing, the U.S. military said in a statement. - alertnet

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 23
BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier was killed when a roadside bomb exploded while he was patrolling on foot in southwest Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement.
*BAGHDAD - Police said three people were killed -- two policemen and a television sports journalist -- when a suicide car bomber struck a police checkpoint near the Green Zone in central Baghdad.
*BAGHDAD - Two policemen were killed and three wounded when a car bomb exploded in the southern Dora district of the capital, police said.
BAGHDAD - Two civilians were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near an Iraqi police patrol in central Baghdad, police said.
MOSUL - An Iraqi army soldier was killed and one wounded when their patrol was struck by a roadside bomb in eastern Mosul, 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
AD-DAWR - Police said gunmen killed a female employee working for a U.S. army base in the town of Ad-Dawr, 150 km (90 miles) north of the capital.
BAGHDAD - Two civilians were wounded when a car bomb exploded near a joint Iraqi-U.S patrol in southern Baghdad, police said.
TAJI - Two U.S. airmen were killed and one wounded by a roadside bomb on Sunday while escorting a convoy near Taji, the U.S military said.
MAHMUDIYA - An Iraqi civilian was killed and four wounded when a car bomb exploded in Mahmudiya, just south of Baghdad, police said. The target of the explosion was not clear. - alertnet

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 24
*KIRKUK - A civilian was killed when a car bomb hit a police patrol in Kirkuk, police said.
BAGHDAD - Police said they raided the Toubji district in Baghdad on Monday and arrested a number of suspects. One witness said police had shot dead his uncle and wounded his mother. Police denied the charge. The Sunni Muslim Scholars' Association said 30 people had been detained and two killed.
*BASRA - Twenty schoolchildren were wounded, two seriously, when a roadside bomb targeted a British patrol in the southern city of Basra, a British military official said.
*BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed a senior member of Sunni Endowments, a group which administers Sunni mosques, in Baghdad on Monday evening, the group said in a statement.
NEAR DUJAIL - The bodies of eight police recruits were found near Dujail on Monday; the eight were among 42 abducted after being ambushed in a rebel area north of Baghdad, police said.
NEAR BAQUBA - The Iraqi army said it raided areas around the city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, arresting 19 wanted men and seizing a number of weapons, ammunition and explosives.
BAIJI - Gunmen kidnapped two German engineers in the Iraqi industrial town of Baiji, police said. Gunmen also killed a police officer in a separate incident in the town, police said.
Gunmen killed Zamil Chyad, a local leader of the Janabi tribe that is seen as sympathetic to al-Qaeda, and a relative.
BAGHDAD - Two U.S soldiers were killed on Monday when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb in southeast Baghdad, the U.S military said.
KIRKUK - An Iraqi civilian was killed and two wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near a police patrol in the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said.
*RAMADI - Two civilians were killed and four wounded when U.S. forces and insurgents clashed in the Sunni rebel stronghold of Ramadi, said Doctor Sabah al-Duleimi from Ramadi Hospital. - alertnet.org

Iraq official: 5 female captives to go free
Two German engineers kidnapped in Iraq; four U.S. troops killed
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- An Iraqi official said Tuesday that five female prisoners in U.S. custody are to be released in two days -- a move that would partially meet the demands of militants who abducted U.S. journalist Jill Carroll.
Muslims and non-Muslims across the globe have called for Carroll's release, including Hamas -- a group considered a terror organization by Israel and the United States
Saeed Syam, a top Hamas official in Gaza, said the group "joins those who ask to release American citizen Jill Carroll" and stressed "we have declared many times we are totally against kidnapping civilians."
"Hamas is against the kidnapping of innocent people, of foreigners who are guests in the Arab countries, and those who introduce humanitarians [sic] services and help for the Arab people -- and for any people in general -- especially when they are not interfering in internal Arab affairs," he said in a statement posted on the Web site of the Christian Science Monitor, for whom Carroll worked in Iraq as a freelancer.
In a video first aired last Tuesday, Carroll's kidnappers said she would be killed unless all female prisoners in U.S. detention were freed, and set a 72-hour deadline The deadline passed with no word on Carroll, who was abducted January 7, or any public extension to the deadline.
Bosho Ibrahim Ali, a deputy justice minister, last week told CNN there were nine female prisoners in U.S. custody. He told CNN Tuesday that the U.S. military on Thursday will release 424 prisoners, including five women. Ali said the other four might be released with another group at another time.
Last week, Ali said he had started his effort to free the female detainees before Carroll was taken hostage. He said he was doing so for humanitarian reasons.
Pentagon officials last week said they were not aware of any plans by the U.S. military to release female Iraqi prisoners held by U.S. forces in Iraq.
Meanwhile, gunmen dressed like members of the Iraqi army kidnapped two German engineers in Baiji on Tuesday morning, an official with the Salaheddin Joint Coordination Center told CNN. According to the official, the engineers were headed to work at a detergent factory on the grounds of the Baiji oil refinery when they were abducted around 8:15 a.m. A special crisis team had been set up to deal with the abduction, German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said.
Blast kills U.S. troops
Four U.S. service members died in Iraq on Monday, according to U.S. military reports.
Two Multi-National Division-Baghdad soldiers were killed when their vehicle was struck by a roadside bomb in southeastern Baghdad.
One soldier died at the scene and the other died en route to a military hospital.
On the northern outskirts of Baghdad, two U.S. Marines died in an accident near Al Taqaddum Monday, a U.S. military statement said. They were assigned to II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) and were killed in a non-combat vehicle accident.
Since the start of war, 2,235 U.S. troops have died in Iraq.
Saddam trial delayed
The former U.S. attorney general now serving as a legal adviser for Saddam Hussein said the latest delay in the former dictator's war crimes trial Tuesday provides "further evidence and strong evidence that the court's dysfunctional." The attorney, Ramsey Clark, asserted that the court should be "abandoned."
"The trial has never been on track," Clark said in an interview on CNN, disputing what he said was President Bush's recent remark that the trial was on track. "What you have is pure chaos," Clark said.
The trial -- which began in October -- was to resume Tuesday, but was delayed until Sunday because witnesses couldn't show up for the proceeding, the court said. The court said they had been away on the Hajj, the holy Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca that ended earlier this month.
Other developments
Police said they believe the discovery Tuesday of 16 bodies was related to the abduction of Sunni Arab men in northwestern Baghdad. On Sunday, men dressed as Iraqi police commandos had taken the Sunnis at gunpoint.
A suicide car bomber blew up at an Iraqi police checkpoint Monday near the city's heavily fortified Green Zone, killing at least three people, an official with the Baghdad emergency police said. At least seven other people were wounded in the explosion, which was not far from the Iranian Embassy, the official said.
Two "serving Iraqi policemen" and "another Iraqi male" were arrested in Basra as part of an effort to fight police corruption in the southern Iraqi city, the U.S. military said Tuesday, adding that British and Danish troops were involved in the operation. The British military, meanwhile, told the Associated Press that its forces and Iraqi troops had detained 14 people in Basra.
CNN's Mohammed Tawfeeq and Shelby Lin contributed to this report. - CNN

Two Kidnapped in Iraq; No Word on Reporter
By PAUL GARWOOD, Associated Press Writer Tue Jan 24, 11:01 PM ET
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Armed men wearing military fatigues seized two German engineers from a car in northern Iraq on Tuesday in the latest brazen kidnapping to push a foreign government into another desperate race to free its nationals.
Efforts continued to rescue Jill Carroll, the American freelance reporter kidnapped Jan. 7 in Baghdad. Carroll's appearance last week on a silent videotape aired on Arab TV marked the only sign of her since her abduction.
More than 250 foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein, and at least 39 have been killed.
The German government confirmed that two young German males from Leipzig were kidnapped Tuesday and said a special crisis team was sent to Iraq to deal with the matter. Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier said Berlin was doing "everything in our power so that we not only receive information, but the hostages will be returned to us safely."
The hostages worked at an Iraqi state-owned detergent plant, near the oil refinery in Beiji, 155 miles north of Baghdad. German media said they were employed by Cryotec Anlagenbau GmbH, a manufacturing and engineering company involved in Iraq since before the 2003 war.
Police Capt. Falah al-Janabi said gunmen using two cars and wearing military uniforms pulled the Germans out of a car while they were heading to work. Another policeman, who declined to be identified for fear of being targeted by insurgents, said two Iraqi men, apparently co-workers, were in the same car as the Germans when at least four militants brandishing semiautomatic weapons stopped them. The kidnappers bundled the Germans into two cars and sped away, leaving the two Iraqis behind, the policeman said. Police searched for the hostages by erecting checkpoints throughout the area, where Brazilian engineer Joao Jose Vasconcelos Jr., was also kidnapped on Jan. 19, 2005. Vasconcelos' whereabouts remain unknown.
Meanwhile, hundreds of Shiite Muslims in the southern city of Basra demanded British troops free Iraqi policemen arrested Tuesday in connection with multiple militia-linked assassinations. In the northern city of Samarra, about 1,000 Sunni Arabs marched to condemn the execution-style killings of 31 Sunnis abducted after being rejected from a police academy.
The U.S. military said four American military personnel were killed in separate incidents on Monday - two soldiers in a Baghdad roadside bombing and two Marines in a vehicle accident west of the capital.
The number of U.S. troops in Iraq has been cut to the lowest level since last summer, when a buildup for election protection expanded the force to about 160,000, Pentagon officials said Tuesday. There are now about 136,000 troops in Iraq, according to Lt. Col. Barry Venable, a Pentagon spokesman. He said this meant that the extra forces in place during the October constitutional referendum and the December parliamentary elections have been removed and a rotation of major combat units has largely been completed.
Car bombs and mortar fire rumbled throughout Baghdad on Tuesday ahead of the planned resumption of Saddam's trial on accusations of playing a role in the 1982 killing of more than 140 Shiite Muslims. But the case was postponed to Sunday amid turmoil over the last-minute replacement of the top two judges on the five-member panel and claims several witnesses were still in Saudi Arabia where they had been performing a Muslim pilgrimage.
A spate of kidnappings and killings targeting Sunni Arabs in recent days also cast a pall over delicate negotiations to form a national unity government of Shiites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds. A major Sunni clerical group, the Association of Muslim Scholars, blamed Shiite-dominated Interior Ministry forces for a Monday raid in Baghdad's Sunni neighborhood of Toubji in which three men were killed and more than 20 abducted.
Another leading Sunni Arab group, the Iraqi Islamic Party, warned its followers to be prepared to confront further armed attacks "by any suitable means." "Any pretext by the government is unacceptable, so we call upon all reasonable Iraqis to do their best to stop the bloodshed and prevent more deterioration in security," said a statement released by the party. The group is a partner in the Sunni Iraqi National Accordance Front that won 44 of the 275 seats in last month's election. - news.yahoo.com

TV presenter jumps from balconey to escape gunmen
25/01/2006 - A well-known Iraqi TV presenter threw herself off her second floor balcony to escape five masked gunmen trying to kidnap her and her husband, she said today.
Speaking from her hospital bed where she is recovering from multiple fractures, Nagham Abdul-Zahra said five gunmen barged into her apartment in the southeastern Baghdad neighbourhood of Risala yesterday morning and tied up both her and her husband.
"For a moment I thought it would be better for me to die in my own way," Abdul-Zahra, a presenter of various variety shows on Sharqiya TV, told Associated Press Television News. "So I stood up when one of the men told me to, and when he turned his head to check if my husband was still tied up tightly, I used that split-second to break away and jump off the balcony," she said.
Despite suffering intense pain after surviving the fall, Abdul-Zahra started screaming for help and the gunmen fled after neighbours were roused by her cries. The assailants then left without harming her husband.
It was unclear why the men broke into the woman's home, but she has been known to millions of Iraqis, even since before the 2003 US-led war that toppled Saddam Hussein, for her talk shows and variety programmes. - IOL

Journalist, U.S. Marine killed in Iraq
Wednesday 25th January, 2006 - Fresh on the news that 150 journalists died on the job worldwide in 2005, another newsman has met his death in Iraq.
Most journalists killed in conflicts around the world have died in war-torn Iraq. A Baghdad television station says journalist Mahmoud Zaal was killed Tuesday as he filmed clashes between insurgents and U.S. troops near the western city of Ramadi. The circumstances surrounding his death are not clear.
The U.S. military also says a Marine was killed Tuesday by small arms fire in al-Karmah, outside Fallujah, adding to the 12 U.S. military deaths that took place between Friday and Monday.
There is no word on the fate of two Germans who were kidnapped Tuesday, or about American journalist Jill Carroll, who was abducted January 7.
Carroll's kidnappers have demanded the release of Iraqi women detainees.
U.S. and Iraqi officials say they plan to soon release some Iraqi detainees, including women - but that the decision has nothing to do with the kidnappers' demands.
A bomb planted on a motorcycle in Baghdad has injured two people. Officials say at least one policeman was injured in the attack Wednesday in the Iraqi capital.
Meanwhile, U.S. military officials have named a number of U.S. service members killed in Iraq in recent days.
Two Marines who died Monday in a non-hostile vehicle accident near Al Taqaddum, were named as Pvt. Lewis T. D. Calapini, 21, of Waipahu, Hawaii, and Lance Cpl. Joshua A. Scott, 24, of Tunnel Hill, Ga. They were assigned to Anti-Terrorism Battalion, 4th Marine Expeditionary Brigade, II Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Lejeune, N.C. Sgt. Matthew D. Hunter, 31, of Valley Grove, W.Va., was killed in Baghdad, on Monday, when an improvised explosive device detonated near his dismounted patrol during combat operations. Hunter was assigned to the 1st Battalion, 502nd Infantry Regiment, 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, Ky.
Two airmen who were killed Sunday when their vehicle struck an improvised explosive device while conducting convoy escort duties in the vicinity of Taji, were named as Tech. Sgt. Jason L. Norton, 32, of Miami, Okla., and Staff Sgt. Brian McElroy, 28, of San Antonio, Texas. Both airmen were assigned to the 3rd Security Forces Squadron, Elmendorf Air Force Base, Alaska.
Two Marines killed Friday by a suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive device while conducting combat operations in Haqlaniyah have been identifed as Cpl. Carlos Arrelanopandura, 22, of Los Angeles, Calif., and Lance Cpl. Brandon Dewey, 20, of San Joaquin, California. They were both assigned to 3rd Battalion, 1st Marine Regiment, 1st Marine Division, I Marine Expeditionary Force, Camp Pendleton, Calif. In Iraq, their unit is attached to 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward).
Four soldiers who died in Al Huwijah on Friday when an improvised explosive device detonated near their HMMWV during patrol operations, were named as Staff Sgt. Rickey Scott, 30, of Columbus, Ga., Sgt. Dennis J. Flanagan, 22, of Inverness, Fla., Spc. Clifton J. Yazzie, 23, of Fruitland, N.M., and Spc. Matthew C. Frantz, 23, of Lafayette, Ind.
Scott, Flanagan and Yazzie were assigned to the 1st Battalion, 327th Infantry Regiment, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, Ky., Frantz was assigned to the 1st Special Troops Battalion, 1st Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, Fort Campbell, Ky. - bignewsnetwork

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 25
*ISHAAQI - A roadside bomb attack on the convoy of army Brigadier Shuja'a al-Saadi killed five of his bodyguards and wounded two others in the town of Ishaaqi, 130 km (80 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
*KARMA - A U.S. marine was killed by small arms fire on Tuesday in the town of Karma, west of Baghdad, said the U.S. military.
SAMARRA - Interior Ministry forces shot dead Karim Jasim Mohammad, a Sunni cleric in Samarra, north of Baghdad. The cleric failed to slow his car as he approached a security checkpoint, Samarra's Joint Coordination Centre said.
BAGHDAD - At least two people, including a policeman, were wounded when a motorcycle bomb aimed against an Iraqi police patrol exploded in central Baghdad, police said.
ISKANDARIYA - Police found a body, blindfolded and handcuffed, in Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad.
MUSAYYIB - Iraqi police found a body dumped in the Euphrates River near the town of Musayyib, blindfolded and hands tied. It had a single bullet wound to the head.
RAMADI - A cameraman working for Baghdad Satellite Channel was killed on Tuesday in clashes between U.S. forces and insurgents. Witnesses said the cameraman was wounded in the firefight and then killed in a U.S. air strike. - alertnet

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 26
* BAGHDAD - Gunmen attacked a convoy of oil trucks with rocket propelled grenades in a western district of the capital, setting at least one truck on fire, police said.
* BAGHDAD - Gunmen killed a policeman and wounded three civilians in southern Baghdad, police said.
* BAGHDAD - Two clerics were killed and the sister of one of them wounded when gunmen opened fire on their car in southern Baghdad, police said.
* NEAR BALAD - Industry Minister Osama Abdel-Aziz al-Najafi escaped an assassination attempt when a roadside bomb hit his convoy near Balad, 90 km (55 miles) north of Baghdad. Three of his bodyguards were killed and another was wounded.
ISHAQI - Five soldiers were killed and two wounded on Wednesday when a roadside bomb hit their convoy in Ishaqi, near Samarra, 100 km (62 miles) north of Baghdad, police and army said.
BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed a U.S soldier and wounded another on Wednesday south of Baghdad, the U.S military said in a statement.
* FALLUJA - A U.S. soldier died after his vehicle was hit by a rocket during combat operations in Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, on Wednesday the U.S. military said in a statement.
MAHAWEEL - A civilian was wounded when a roadside bomb went off near a Shi'ite mosque in Mahaweel, south of Baghdad, police said.
KIRKUK - Gunmen killed Juma'a Rashid, the brother of a leader in the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, in the northern oil city of Kirkuk, police said. Army of Ansar al-Sunna claimed the killing in an Internet statement.
Othman Rashid, a member of the Kurdistan Democratic Party, was killed by gunmen in a separate incident. - alertnet

week old footage airs on Al Jazeera: Iraq Abductors Threaten 4 Peace Activists
28-1-2006 BAGHDAD, Iraq - The kidnappers of four Christian peace activists threatened to kill them unless all Iraqi prisoners are released from Iraqi and U.S. prisons, according to a new tape broadcast Saturday.
Al-Jazeera TV aired a tape dated Jan. 21 showing the four workers - two Canadians, an American and a Briton - from the Chicago-based Christian Peacemaker Teams, who disappeared Nov. 26. The previously unknown Swords of Righteous Bridges claimed responsibility for kidnapping them.
The news reader said the group issued a statement with the tape saying it was the "last chance" for U.S. and Iraqi authorities to "release all Iraqi prisoners in return of freeing the hostages, otherwise their fate will be death."

No deadline was set.
Canadian hostages James Loney, 41, and Harmeet Singh Sooden, 32; Tom Fox, 54, of Clear Brook, Va., and Norman Kember, 74, of London, had been warned repeatedly by Iraqi and Western security officials before being abducted that they were taking a grave risk by moving around Baghdad without bodyguards. The footage showing the men was gray and apparently shot using the camera's night-vision function. It showed each of the four men standing near a wall, before cutting away to another shot in which they were seated and talking but their voices were not heard.
Carol Rose, a U.S.-based coordinator for Christian Peacemaker, said she could not comment immediately as they were still waiting to see the tape. Al-Jazeera editor Saad al-Dosari declined to say how the station obtained the tape, which was about 55 seconds long. He said the entire tape aired.
Christian Peacemaker Teams has been working in Iraq since October 2002, investigating allegations of abuse against Iraqi detainees by American and Iraqi forces. Its teams host human rights conferences in conflict zones, promoting peaceful solutions.
More than 250 foreigners have been taken hostage in Iraq since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam, and at least 39 have been killed. Among the hostages still unaccounted for is American reporter Jill Carroll, 28, who was abducted Jan. 7 in Baghdad. Her kidnappers have demanded the release of all Iraqi women in custody.
The U.S. military said this week's release of five Iraqi women from military custody was coincidental and not in response to the ultimatum. - news.yahoo.com

Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 28
KERBALA - Police patrols found six bodies blindfolded and with their hands tied behind their backs in a deserted area 20 km (12 miles) east of Kerbala. All had been shot, police said.
ISHAAQI - Gunmen killed an Iraqi employee of a U.S. military base in his house in Ishaaqi, 90 km (60 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
FALLUJA - Two policemen were killed and three wounded when a roadside bomb struck their patrol in Falluja, 50 km (32 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.
TUZ KHURMATU - An oil tanker driver was killed and three tankers destroyed when a car bomb hit their convoy in Tuz Khurmatu, 70 km (40 miles) south of the northern oil city of Kirkuk on Friday, police said.
MOSUL - Two Iraqi soldiers died and four were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol in Tal Afar, 50 km (32 miles) west of the northern city of Mosul on Friday, the U.S. military said. In a separate bombing in the same area, one civilian was killed and another wounded. Two Iraqi soldiers were also wounded in the explosion, the U.S. military said.
* BAGHDAD - Abdul Razak al-Na'as, a professor in the University of Baghdad, was killed by gunmen as he was left his office in central Baghdad, police said.
* TIKRIT - Four Iraqi National Guards were killed and five wounded when a car bomb exploded next to their patrol in Oweija, 10 km (6 miles) south of Tikrit, police said.
* RAMADI - Four civilians were killed when gunmen, in two cars, opened fire on them as they left a mosque in Ramadi 110 km (68 miles) west of Baghdad, police said. - alertnet

US forces held Iraqi suspects' wives
Will Dunham - Washington - January 29, 2006
US forces in Iraq took into custody the wives of two men believed to be insurgents, in an apparent attempt to pressure the suspects into giving themselves up, according to military documents. According to an account by a civilian Defence Intelligence Agency officer, members of a shadowy military taskforce seized a mother of three young children "in order to leverage" her husband's surrender.
In another incident, a US military officer sent an email asking, "Have you tacked a note on the door and challenged him to come get his wife?" The incidents happened in 2004. The documents were among thousands obtained by the American Civil Liberties Union from the Government under the Freedom of Information Act.
"This is not an acceptable tactic, nor are any of the other abusive techniques acceptable," union lawyer Amrit Singh said on Friday.
Paul Boyce, an army spokesman at the Pentagon, said: "It's very hard, obviously, from some of these documents to determine what, if anything, actually happened … When you see an individual email note, it's oftentimes very confusing to figure out how that particular case fits into an overall, larger puzzle."
Mr Boyce also said the military had thoroughly looked at "any allegation against soldiers of misconduct or abuse of detainees".
A memo written by a Defence Intelligence Agency employee on June 10, 2004, and labelled "secret" referred to "violations of the Geneva Convention" relating to detainee abuse and illegal detention of noncombatants. It described the actions of Taskforce 6-26, which has been named in other papers in connection with claims of detainee abuse, and stated that on May 9, 2004, taskforce members detained the wife of "a suspected terrorist" in Tarmiya, Iraq.
"The 28-year-old woman had three young children at the house, one being as young as six months and still nursing. Her husband was the primary target of the raid, with other suspect personnel subject to detainment as well," the memo stated. "During the pre-operational brief, it was recommended by TF (taskforce) personnel that if the wife were present, she be detained and held in order to leverage the primary target's surrender."
The memo's author, who officially reported the incident said: "I objected to the detainment of the young mother to the raid team leader … I determined that the wife could provide no actionable intelligence leading to the arrest of her husband. Despite my protest, (the) raid team leader detained her anyway." The memo said the woman was freed two days later into the custody of a sheikh.
In the other case, a US lieutenant-colonel emailed: "What are you guys doing to try to get the husband - have you tacked a note on the door and challenged him to come get his wife? … or something more sophisticated, I suspect, from the 'not necessarily the cool guys, but the guys with the cool stuff?' "
A later email stated: "These ladies fought back extremely hard during the original detention. They have shown indications of deceipt (sic) and misinformation."
Hostages in video appeal for help
Two German hostages in Iraq have appeared in a video urging their Government to help free them, and Chancellor Angela Merkel vowed to do everything she could. The recording, aired by the Arabic news broadcaster al-Jazeera, showed the pair kneeling in front of four masked gunmen. Their voices were inaudible, but al-Jazeera said the video, which had a date stamp of January 24, the day of their abduction, showed the two men urging Berlin to help. Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier told reporters the footage was devastating. - vis The Age.AU

FACTBOX-Security incidents in Iraq, Jan. 29
KIRKUK - U.S forces killed three Iraqi suspects and wounded another as they were driving a car wearing police uniforms in the northern city of Kirkuk, police Colonel Adel Zain Alabdin said.
BAQUBA - Thirty people were arrested, including two top suspects, by U.S and Iraqi forces in Sebtiya, a northern suburb of Baquba, a source in the army said.
BAGHDAD - Three decapitated bodies were found on Saturday by U.S forces in a soccer field west of Baghdad, the U.S military said.
TIKRIT - Mahmoud Badawi, a former lieutenant general in Saddam Hussein's army, was killed late on Saturday when a rocket hit his house in Tikrit, 175 km (110 miles) north of Baghdad, police said.
ISKANDARIYA - Eleven Iraqis were killed and five wounded late on Saturday when a bomb planted just outside a sweet shop exploded in Iskandariya, 40 km (25 miles) south of Baghdad, police said.
* BAQUBA - A policeman was killed and four were wounded when gunmen opened fire on a checkpoint in eastern Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad, police said. The Qaeda-led Mujahideen Council claimed responsibility for the attack.
In a separate attack, two policemen and five civilians were wounded when gunmen fired mortar rounds then start shooting at a police patrol in the city centre, police added. - alertnet

U.S. officials, Iraqi insurgents meeting
Big News Network.com Monday 30th January, 2006 (UPI)
American officials in Iraq are engaging face-to-face talks with high-level Iraqi Sunni insurgents, Newsweek reported Sunday.
Americans are meeting with senior members of the leadership of the Iraqi insurgency, Americans and Iraqis with knowledge of the talks told the magazine. The talks are taking place at U.S. military bases in Anbar province, as well as in Jordan and Syria.
"Now we have won over the Sunni political leadership," said U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad. "The next step is to win over the insurgents."
The groups include Baathist cells and religious Islamic factions, as well as former Special Republican Guards and intelligence agents, said a U.S. official with knowledge of the talks.
"We want things from the U.S. side, stopping misconduct by U.S. forces, preventing Iranian intervention," said one prominent insurgent leader from a group called the Army of the mujahedin. "We can't achieve that without actual meetings."
U.S. intelligence officials have had back-channel contacts with insurgent groups for many months, but this is the first time either Americans or insurgents have admitted that senior leaders have met at the negotiating table for planning purposes.
[read that last sentence again!]

US journalist in fresh video appeal
Tuesday 31 January 2006 - Jill Carroll, the kidnapped US journalist held in Iraq, has appeared in a new video, weeping and appealing for the release of women Iraqi prisoners. The video, aired by Aljazeera on Monday, showed Carroll wearing a veil but carried no sound.
Aljazeera said the 28-year-old journalist appealed for the release of women Iraqi prisoners.
The footage had a time signature with the date 28 January.
Aljazeera's newscaster said in the video Carroll appealed to the US military and the Iraqi Interior Ministry to release all women in their prisons and that this "would help in winning her release".
Armed men abducted Jill Carroll, a freelance reporter for the Christian Science Monitor, on 7 January in Baghdad and threatened to kill her unless all Iraqi women prisoners were released. Her translator was shot to death dead during the kidnapping.

The latest video of Carroll was widely reported in the United States, but most television stations refused to broadcast more than a few seconds of it, calling it too disturbing. The Christian Science Monitor expressed deep concern on Monday over her fate. Editor Richard Bergenheim said: "Anyone with a heart will feel distressed that an innocent woman like Jill Carroll would be treated in the manner shown in the latest video."
Detainees freed
The US military said on Thursday it would release five Iraqi women detainees. A US official said the release had nothing to do with the kidnappers' demand. Her appearance contrasted with a previous video released on 17 January, which showed Carroll, 28, wearing a grey sweatshirt with her long brown hair loose. It was the first news of the journalist since the tape broadcast on 17 January, which threatened to kill her if prisoners in Iraq were not released. The corner of the screen was marked with the caption Brigades of Vengeance, the name of the group said to have issued the 17 January tape and claimed her kidnapping. She was pictured against a coloured background which appeared to be a carpet.
More than 400 Iraqi detainees including five women were released last week. But another four women are still held in US-administered prisons.
The freelance journalist, was abducted by armed men on 7 January in Baghdad who shot and killed dead interpreter. She had visited the office of a prominent Sunni political figure, Adnan al-Dulaimi, whom she had asked to interview.
Impassioned pleas
Carroll set out to learn Arabic and cover the Iraq conflict in 2002, moving to Jordan. In 2003, she arrived in Baghdad and later began writing regularly for the Boston-based newspaper The Christian Science Monitor. Her parents, US officials, and Dulaimi himself have all made impassioned calls for her release.

Adnan Dulaimi, the Sunni leader, has pleaded for Carroll's release

The new tape comes amid a new spike in hostage taking in Iraq, with anti-US and anti-government fighters releasing tapes of several foreign captives over the past days. A group holding four Western peace activists, captive in Iraq since November, last week issued a new video of their captives, saying it was giving a "last chance" for its demands to be met, Two German engineers seized in northern Iraq appealed on Friday to Germany to save their lives. Earlier this month, two Kenyan telecommunications engineers were kidnapped in Baghdad, but no information had been released on their status or whereabouts. .aljazeera.net

Blast kills 100th British soldier in Iraq
LONDON, Jan 31 (Reuters) - A British soldier was killed by an explosion in southern Iraq on Tuesday, becoming the 100th British service member to die in the campaign since the U.S.-led invasion in 2003.
The Ministry of Defence said three other soldiers were hurt, one seriously, in the blast which took place on Tuesday morning in Iraq's Basra province. It gave no further details. alertnet