Hundreds of US and Iraqi forces yesterday launched their biggest Baghdad raid in recent weeks, moving on foot through a central neighborhood and rounding up dozens of suspected insurgents, the military said.
About 500 members of Iraq's police and army swept through buildings in the Rashid neighborhood along with a "couple hundred" US soldiers, detaining 65 suspected militants, Lieutenant Colonel Clifford Kent of the US Army's 3rd Infantry Division said.
One Iraqi soldier suffered in-juries but no US casualties were reported in the largest joint US-Iraqi raid in Iraq's capital since the Fort Stewart, Georgia-based 3rd Infantry Division assumed responsibility for the city on Feb. 27, Kent said.
One suspected insurgent was also being treated for wounds, the military said in a statement.
In the western town of Qaim, witnesses said insurgents hit the main gates of a US military base with twin suicide car bombs early yesterday.
At least three civilians were injured, said Ammar Fuad, a doctor at the hospital where they were taken. US military officials had no immediate comment.
In Baqouba, 60km northeast of Baghdad, demonstrators chanted anti-US slogans, continuing three days of protests against US forces. Tens of thousands gathered on Saturday in Baghdad to call for US-led troops to leave, and more demonstrations were held on Sunday.
A Defense Ministry official said yesterday that Iraqi security forces have arrested a person claimed responsibility for the kidnapping of two French journalists abducted and later released in Iraq. Iraqi army soldiers detained Amer Hussein Sheikhan in the Mahmoudiya area on April 4, said the official who spoke on condition of anonymity. No further details were available.
Journalists Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot were released in December after four months in captivity.
A group claiming to have kidnapped a Pakistani diplomat in Iraq has demanded money for his release, a senior Pakistani government official said yesterday on condition of anonymity.
Malik Mohammed Javed, a deputy counselor at the Pakistani mission in Baghdad, went missing late Saturday after leaving home for prayers at a nearby mosque.
Pakistan, a key US ally in the war against terrorism, has refused to deploy peacekeepers and has urged its citizens to avoid coming here.
also see story:
US accused of seizing Iraqi women hostages
PRECISION STRIKES: The most significant reason to deploy HIMARS to outlying islands is to establish a ‘dead zone’ that the PLA would not dare enter, a source said A High Mobility Artillery Rocket System (HIMARS) would be deployed to Penghu County and Dongyin Island (東引) in Lienchiang County (Matsu) to force the Chinese military to retreat at least 100km from the coastline, a military source said yesterday. Taiwan has been procuring HIMARS and Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) from the US in batches. Once all batches have been delivered, Taiwan would possess 111 HIMARS units and 504 ATACMS, which have a range of 300km. Considering that “offense is the best defense,” the military plans to forward-deploy the systems to outlying islands such as Penghu and Dongyin so that
WHAT WAS ALL THAT FOR? Jaw Shaw-kong said that Cheng Li-wen had pushed for more drastic cuts and attacked him, just for the outcome to be nearly identical to his bill The legislature yesterday passed a supplementary budget bill to fund the purchase of separate packages of US military equipment, with the combined amount of spending capped at NT$780 billion (US$24.8 billion). The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) used their legislative majority to pass the bill, which runs until 2033 and has two main funding provisions. One was for NT$300 billion of arms sales already approved by the US for Taiwan on Dec. 17 last year, the other was for NT$480 billion for another arms package expected to be announced by Washington. The bill, which fell short of the NT$1.25
‘CLEAR MESSAGE’: The bill would set up an interagency ‘tiger team’ to review sanctions tools and other economic options to help deter any Chinese aggression toward Taiwan US Representative Young Kim has introduced a bill to deter Chinese aggression against Taiwan, calling for an interagency “tiger team” to preplan coordinated sanctions and economic measures in response to possible Chinese military or political action against Taiwan. “[Chinese President] Xi Jinping [習近平] has directed the People’s Liberation Army to be ready to invade Taiwan by 2027. China has a plan. America should have one too,” Kim said in a news release on Thursday last week. She introduced the “Deter PRC [People’s Republic of China] aggression against Taiwan act” to “ensure the US has a coordinated sanctions strategy ready should
A former television news host and six military personnel — active and retired — have been indicted on espionage charges, Kaohsiung prosecutors said yesterday. Lin Chen-you (林宸佑), a former CTi News host and YouTuber, last year allegedly made videos at the direction of a Chinese agent criticizing the Democratic Progressive Party’s recall campaign, the Ciaotou District Prosecutors’ Office told a news conference in Kaohsiung. He allegedly received 4,325 tether coins for the videos from an unidentified person surnamed Huang (黃), believed to be an agent of a hostile foreign power, they said. Lin, also known as Ma Te (馬德), has a show named
RSS