The most wanted man in Iraq, Islamic militant leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, is "most likely" in Baghdad after losing his sanctuary in the western city of Falluja, but he is having a tougher time planning and launching attacks, a top U.S. general says. "He can operate pretty safely, we think," said Lt. Gen. Lance Smith, the deputy chief of U.S. forces in the Middle East. "In some areas of Baghdad, there are those that would hide him and those that would passively allow him to operate. You can find him someplace else tomorrow."U.S. soldiers and Marines, aided by about 2,000 troops from Iraq's fledgling army, recaptured Falluja in November after it had been effectively controlled by insurgents for months. Smith said the loss of Falluja has made it more difficult for al-Zarqawi to communicate with his lieutenants, but "he has not been emasculated."
"He no doubt maintains communications with key elements of his leadership and is able to continue some level of command and control over the disparate operations," Smith told reporters at the Pentagon on Wednesday. "It is just far more difficult to do now because they can't do it, generally speaking, via electronic means. They do it by meeting in cars and driving around and giving guidance and doing all that stuff."
Smith said he believed al-Zarqawi was still able to operate within Iraq, and Baghdad "would be the most likely area." But he added: "These guys are getting very, very good at concealing or making it difficult for us to track them."
The Pentagon has boosted U.S. troop strength in Iraq to an all-time high of 150,000 in order to provide security for the country's scheduled elections in January, and Smith said most of the problems are limited to four of the country's 18 provinces.
"It is absolutely clear that the insurgents will make every effort to try and make these elections as difficult as possible and try to force a delay," he said.
Responding to a reporter's question regarding Iran and Syria's rumored support for al-Zarqawi's terror network, the president said: "We have made it clear to the countries in the neighborhood, including the two mentioned, that we expect there to be help in establishing a society in which people are able to elect their leaders, and that we expect people to work with the Iraqi interim government to enforce borders, to stop the flow of people and money aimed to help these terrorists."
The United Nations plans to open more offices in Iraq to help with the preparations for the January 30 elections, a spokesman for U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan said Wednesday.
A statement said Annan instructed that "the first steps be taken to assess the security conditions" for a U.N. presence in Basra and in Erbil.
A bomb killed seven Iraqis and wounded 32 on Wednesday near the Imam Hussein mosque in Karbala, police sources told CNN.
Sheikh Abdul Mehdi al-Karbalai -- a Karbala-based aide to Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani -- was wounded in the attack, a representative from al-Sistani's office in Najaf said.
The Iraqi special tribunal set up to try Saddam Hussein and former members of his regime will soon begin investigative hearings, marking the first stage in bringing members of the ousted Iraqi government to justice for alleged war crimes. The tribunal released a statement late Wednesday saying the investigative hearings are to soon get under way "in coordination with international observers." The Defense Ministry said Wednesday that Ali Hassan al-Majid -- also known as "Chemical Ali" -- would be tried first, possibly by the end of the month.
The Italian Foreign Ministry Thursday said it is investigating a report that an Italian citizen was abducted and killed in Iraq, cautioning that "nothing has been confirmed." The ministry said it was contacted by The Associated Press after a photographer in Iraq claimed insurgents showed him the body of a man killed in Iraq who had papers identifying him as Salvatore Santoro, 52, of Italy. The government said Santoro had previously contacted the Italian Embassy in Lebanon and said he was going to Iraq with a British humanitarian aid company.
Three Polish soldiers were killed and four wounded when their helicopter made an emergency landing near Karbala, the Polish military said. Engine trouble forced down the Sokol chopper, officials said. The incident brings the number of Polish deaths in Iraq to 16.