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Zarqawi may have shifted residence to Fallujah
Iraq's most feared terror group claimed responsibility Sunday for slaughtering members of the Iraqi security forces in Mosul, where dozens of bodies have been found. The claim raises fears the terror group has expanded to the north after the loss of its purported base in Fallujah. A statement posted on an Islamist Web site in the name of al-Qaida in Iraq, led by Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, claimed responsibility for killing 17 members of Iraq's security forces and a Kurdish militiaman in Mosul, where insurgents rose up this month in support of guerrillas facing a U.S.-led assault in Fallujah... Separately, al-Zarqawi's group claimed it detonated a car bomb near a U.S. military convoy in the Hamam al-Alil area, near Mosul. It said the blast destroyed an armored vehicle and damaged another. Although the claims were not verifiable, they raised fears that al-Zarqawi's organization had spread to Mosul, Iraq's third-largest city, 225 miles north of Baghdad. At least 43 suspected insurgents have been arrested as part of an ongoing operation to re-establish control of Mosul, a military statement said. Elsewhere, a car bomb killed six people and injured five others in Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad. The blast occurred as a minibus drove past a school, police Maj. Qahtan Mohammed said. All the casualties were passengers in the minibus, he said. U.S. and Iraqi troops regained control of Samarra from insurgents during military operations in September but the city remains uneasy. Posted by: Dan Darling 2004-11-29 |
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