Iraqi policemen, US soldiers killed
As Iraqi leaders conducted last minute negotiations to wrap up a constitution draft, confrontations on the ground continued to disrupt Iraqis’ life.
Eight Iraqi policemen wearing civilian clothes and two Iraqi civilians were killed in Iraq on Monday, according to police and hospital sources.
The policemen, who had left their police station wearing civilian clothes, were travelling in a minivan along with three other civilians when attackers followed them in three cars and sprayed them with gunfire, police Captain Karim al-Salmani said.
Police also found four bodies in a western Baghdad district near a mosque, an Interior Ministry source said. Two of the bodies were found on the highway and the other two were found in a semi-built house in the area. The identities of the victims were not immediately clear.
In Samara, two US soldiers were killed and two were wounded when a roadside bomb exploded as they were conducting a patrol near Samarra, north of Baghdad, the military said in a statement. No further details were provided.
The deaths raised to 1871 the number of US troops that have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003.
One Iraqi policeman was killed when attackers sprayed his vehicle with gunfire in the northern city of Samarra, police said.
Construction workers
In southern Iraq 11 Pakistani construction workers abducted earlier in the month were released, Pakistan‘s Foreign Ministry said.
The Pakistanis, who were working for a Kuwaiti company, were seized on 13 August near the town of Nassiriya, ministry spokesman Muhammad Naeem Khan said.
A counter-terrorism security official, Captain Ibrahim Saeed, and his wife were assassinated in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, police said.
And three policemen were badly injured when a roadside bomb blew up near their patrol in central Kirkuk, police Captain Ahmed Abdullah said.
Wedding party
Meanwhile, the US military denied it bombed a wedding party in the western town of Hiyt on Friday.
“We did not drop any bombs from aircraft on Friday in Anbar,” an emailed response to a query said.
On Friday, hospital officials in the town said one person was killed and 16 were wounded in an air strike on a wedding.