In the central Shiite shrine city of Karabala, armed men gunned down four members of a family, a police officer said, adding that two more people were wounded when gunmen riddled the car with bullets. Meanwhile, the US military said it had captured two Al Qaeda militants suspected of involvement in the kidnapping of three American soldiers in May. Troops captured the pair in an air and ground assault south of Baghdad on Wednesday in the Sunni town of Jurf Al Sakhr. One soldierÂ’s body was found floating in the Euphrates River a few days after the kidnapping, but the military is still searching the other two soldiers.
Separately, a pre-dawn US air strike killed five militants trying to plant a roadside bomb in the central city of Diwaniyah, the military said. A local police officer also reported clashes between Mahdi Army militants and US forces in the city in which three militants were killed. Since last year Diwaniyah, a flashpoint for rival Shiite factions battling for supremacy in the region, has regularly witnessed severe clashes between Shiite militiamen and US and Iraqi security forces.