An American Black Hawk helicopter crashed near former president Saddam Hussein's hometown in Iraq yesterday, killing all six people on board, and US soldiers said it had been probably shot down with a rocket-propelled grenade.
Apache attack helicopters were scouring the area around the crash site in Tikrit, 175km north of Baghdad, hunting for guerrillas who may have brought the Black Hawk down.
If confirmed to have been destroyed by hostile fire, it would be the third US helicopter brought down by guerrillas in two weeks.
"At approximately 9am this morning a UH-60 Black Hawk helicopter went down," Major Josslyn Aberle of the 4th Infantry Division told reporters. "At this stage we don't know if it was due to mechanical failure or another reason."
But soldiers in Tikrit said initial reports suggested the helicopter had been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.
Last Sunday, guerrillas shot down a US Chinook helicopter west of Baghdad as it carried troops on a rest and recreation break, killing 16 American soldiers in the deadliest single strike on US-led forces since they invaded to oust Saddam.
On Oct. 25, guerrillas brought down a Black Hawk in Tikrit, hitting one of its engines with a rocket-propelled grenade. The helicopter made an emergency landing, and all five crew members escaped before it was engulfed in flames.
In the northern city of Mosul, an ambush on a convoy killed one soldier and wounded six others yesterday, Sergeant Kelly Tyler of the 101st Airborne Division told reporters. In a separate attack in the town, a bomb wounded three US soldiers.
The ambush brought to at least 140 the number of US soldiers killed in action since Washington declared major combat over on May 1 -- more than the 114 killed in March and April.
A Polish major was shot dead south of Baghdad on Thursday, the first soldier from a multinational division policing central Iraq to be killed in action.
Yesterday morning in Baghdad, guerrillas fired a rocket-propelled grenade at a US tank and a civilian vehicle with American soldiers inside, wounding one soldier and an Iraqi boy, witnesses said.
The mounting US death toll in Iraq and the failure to find Saddam's alleged arsenal of weapons of mass destruction have put pressure on US President George W. Bush, bidding for re-election next year.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique