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Four americans killed in kufa { May 31 2004 } Original Source Link: (May no longer be active)
http://www.suntimes.com/output/iraq/cst-nws-iraq31.htmlhttp://www.suntimes.com/output/iraq/cst-nws-iraq31.html
Four Americans killed over weekend
May 31, 2004
BY MARIAM FAM ASSOCIATED PRESS
KUFA, Iraq-- U.S. troops clashed Monday with Shiite militiamen in fighting that killed two Americans and strained a cease-fire called last week around the holy cities of Kufa and Najaf. In Baghdad, a car bomb exploded near U.S. coalition headquarters, killing four people and injuring 25.
Two other American soldiers died over the weekend in separate attacks, the U.S. military said.
Ambulances rushed to the scene of the blast in Baghdad's Harithiyah district, about half a mile from where the head of the Governing Council, Izzadine Saleem, was assassinated in a car bombing May 17. It was not clear whether Monday's bombing was caused by a suicide attacker.
The blast showered the area with debris and bits of human flesh. At least one body lay on the street, covered with plastic sheets. U.S. troops fired into the air to disperse crowds.
"It felt like our house was lifted into the air and came down with a bang," said resident Alla Faleh Hassan.
Hours later, U.S. troops defused a second car bomb nearby.
The target of the blast was unclear. Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said no prominent Iraqi political figures were in the area at the time.
Neighbors and a close relative said one of the dead was Sabiha Aref, 72, the sister of two former Iraqi presidents, Abdel-Salam Aref and Abdel-Rahman Aref. She was killed by flying glass while cooking lunch at home, the relative said.
Shiite leaders, meanwhile, called on U.S. forces to halt "aggressive patrolling" around Kufa and Najaf to shore up a peace accord that is rapidly unraveling there, 100 miles south of Baghdad.
The fighting in Kufa broke out Sunday night and lasted until early Monday. Shiite attackers loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr ambushed a patrol with small arms fire, killing one U.S. soldier, and fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a tank, killing another American, according to the U.S. military.
At least one Iraqi was killed and eight injured, hospital officials said. Al-Sadr's militia often avoids taking its casualties to government hospitals for fear of arrest.
Shiite militiamen accused U.S. troops of firing near the city's main mosque, damaging its outer marble wall. The bodies of two slain militiamen lay on the mosque's blood-soaked floor, covered with blankets.
"They have no respect for holy sites or for human rights," said one fighter, who gave only his first name, Abu Sayf. "This is a violation of the truce."
CNN, which has a reporter embedded with 1st Armored Division troops in Kufa, spoke of a "major firefight" that began when U.S. soldiers tried to secure a police station. CNN quoted soldiers as saying it was the most intense fighting in the area in the past six weeks.
Al-Sadr's fighters took over in early April after occupation authorities cracked down, closing his newspaper, arresting a key lieutenant and announcing an arrest warrant against him for the murder of a rival cleric.
Under a deal Thursday with Shiite leaders, al-Sadr agreed to remove his fighters from the streets and begin talks with the clerical hierarchy over the future of his militia and the warrant against him. U.S. troops agreed to halt offensive operations around Najaf and Kufa.
However, daily clashes since then have threatened to scuttle the deal.
Iraqi Governing Council member Ahmad Chalabi, who met with al-Sadr's aides Sunday night, announced a proposal Monday to shore up the fraying peace accord. It called for an end to "aggressive patrolling" by the Americans and the removal of armed militiamen from the streets. A Shiite observer team would monitor compliance, Chalabi said.
Iraqi police would take over security in Najaf, and there would be no joint U.S.-Iraqi patrols, he said. Those militiamen not from Najaf and Kufa would go home.
Chalabi said the proposal had not yet been approved by the U.S. command in Baghdad.
Meanwhile, a dispute between Iraq's Governing Council and U.S. occupation authorities over the president of a new transitional government delayed formation of the new Cabinet to take power June 30.
A council member, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the U.S. governor of Iraq, L. Paul Bremer, and special U.N. envoy Lakhdar Brahimi were exerting pressure on the U.S.-appointed group to choose former Foreign Minister Adnan Pachachi, a Sunni Muslim councilman.
However, the current council chairman, civil engineer Ghazi Mashal Ajil al-Yawer, was believed to be the choice of most of the 22 members.
Council members conferred Sunday but postponed a session set for Monday.
In other violence:
Two other U.S. soldiers died in separate incidents over the weekend. A Task Force 1st Armored Division soldier died Sunday and two others were injured when a roadside bomb exploded south of Baghdad, the military reported. A Stryker Brigade soldier also died Sunday from wounds following a mortar attack Saturday in the northern city of Mosul.
Assailants ambushed a convoy of Britons on a northern Baghdad highway on Sunday, killing one Iraqi security guard and a bystander, officials and witnesses said. The British Foreign Office said four Britons and a second Iraqi jumped out of the vehicles and escaped.
Roadside bombs also exploded in the southern city of Basra, where five policemen were injured, and in Samawah, where a U.S. convoy was targeted. There were no casualties reported in the Samawah attack.
Copyright 2004 Associated Press.
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