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| Iraq-Jordan |
| Five policemen shot dead |
| 2005-05-01 |
| INSURGENTS shot dead five Iraqi policemen at a Baghdad checkpoint today and a bomb exploded nearby, underscoring the dire security situation on the third day of violence since a new government was formed. The attack near a military college serving as a US military camp reinforced concerns that US-trained Iraqi forces still have a long way to go before they can take over security from American soldiers. In the three days since Iraq announced the formation of a government — after three months of negotiations — insurgents have carried out a furious sequence of bombings, including more than 15 blasts in Baghdad, killing dozens. Iraqi officials say militants have capitalised on the months of political haggling over the government's formation to step up their attacks in a campaign that has erased much of the optimism created by the January 30 elections. The political squabbling and renewed violence also appear to have fuelled sectarian tensions, with politicians struggling to balance the interests of Shi'ites and Kurds, who are the new powers, and the Sunnis who dominated Iraq under Saddam Hussein. While most of the violence in the past three days has focused on the capital and nearby areas, there are still attacks in the country's traditional hotspots. Guerrillas fired at least seven rockets into the city of Fallujah yesterday, killing three Iraqi civilians and wounding another, the US military said. A US-led military offensive in November killed or captured hundreds of insurgents in Fallujah, a former rebel stronghold, and destroyed the nerve centre of the guerrillas. Since then, militants appear to have taken their operations elsewhere. They have stepped up activities in cities such as Mosul, where the US military said a bomb hidden in a shrine killed three Iraqi civilians yesterday, and a suicide bomber attacked an American convoy, killing two Iraqis. A US soldier was killed by small-arms fire yesterday in the town of Khaldiya, about 130km west of Baghdad, raising to at least 1206 the number of American soldiers killed in action since the war that toppled Saddam started in 2003. Iraqi politicians want to show their people that their own security forces can defeat Saddam loyalists and militant followers of al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian who is the most hunted man in Iraq, with a $US25 million ($32.15 million) bounty on his head. But America's top general said this week insurgents were as strong as they were a year ago, mounting up to 60 attacks a day, despite the presence of about 140,000 US troops and more than that number employed in the Iraqi security forces. Guerrillas seem to be implementing a ruthless new strategy of following up one suicide bombing with a second, aimed at police and security forces who rush to the scene. In an audio tape put on the internet, a person purporting to be Zarqawi on Friday threatened more bombings and bloodshed in Iraq and said US President George W Bush would not be allowed to "enjoy peace of mind". |
| Posted by:God Save The World |