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| Iraq |
| Five Ansar Gunnies Killed in Attack in Northern Iraq |
| 2003-03-04 |
| Members of an Islamic militant group and Kurdish soldiers exchanged gunfire at a military checkpoint in northern Iraq on Tuesday, killing five people, Kurdish officials and witnesses said. Officials of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan, which rules the eastern half of the Kurdish autonomous province in northern Iraq, blamed the attack near the city of Sulaymaniyah on the militant Islamic group Ansar al Islam, which is suspected of having links to al-Qaida. The United States also has accused Ansar of cooperating with Saddam Hussein's regime, which it accuses of harboring weapons of mass destruction in defiance of U.N. orders. The five dead were all members of the militant group, Kurdish officials said on condition of anonymity. Kurdish officials dragged blood-soaked bodies out of the truck driven by the attackers. It's a start. |
| Posted by:Steve |
| #1 The Islamic Republic News Agency has a slightly different spin on this story: Suleimanieh, March 4, IRNA -- Forces loyal to Patriotic Union of Kurdistan shot dead a member of the political bureau of Iraqi Kurdistan Jamaat-e Islami Party Mullah Abdullah Qasri here on Tuesday. Altercation between Qasri and four of his companions with the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) patrollers had reportedly led to the murder. The incident claimed the lives of all of Qasri's companions. No report is yet available on casualties among PUK forces. Gee, do I detect the slightest amount of bias? |
| Posted by: Steve 2003-03-04 13:37:29 |