Shops and schools were open in the Fallujah yesterday and there was no sound of any fighting one day after frenzied crowds dragged the burned and mutilated bodies of four US civilians through the streets and strung two of them up from a bridge after rebels had ambushed their vehicles.
A handful of Iraqi police manned their standard roadside checkpoints and there was no sign of US troops.
Some of the bodies of the four Americans were loaded onto the back of a donkey-pulled wooden cart Wednesday evening and paraded through Fallujah's streets as crowds clapped and whistled. It was not clear where the bodies were early yesterday.
PHOTO: EPA
Five US soldiers were also killed on Wednesday when a bomb exploded under their armored vehicle north of Fallujah, about 55km west of Baghdad, making it the bloodiest day for Americans in Iraq since Jan. 8.
Chanting "Fallujah is the graveyard of Americans," residents celebrated after the assault on two four-wheel-drive civilian vehicles left both cars in flames.
Residents in Fallujah said insurgents attacked the contractors with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades. After the attack, a jubilant crowd of civilians, none of whom appeared to be armed, gathered to celebrate, dragging the bodies through the street and hanging two of them from the bridge. Many of those in the crowd were excited young boys who shouted slogans in front of TV cameras.
AP Television News pictures showed one man beating a charred corpse with a metal pole. Others tied a yellow rope to a body, hooked it to a car and dragged it down the main street of town. Two blackened and mangled corpses were hung from the green iron bridge spanning the Euphrates River.
"The people of Fallujah hung some of the bodies on the old bridge like slaughtered sheep," resident Abdul Aziz Mohammed said. Some corpses were dismembered, he said.
US officials blamed terrorists and remnants of Saddam Hussein's former regime for the "horrific attacks" on the US contractors.
"It is offensive, it is despicable the way these individuals have been treated," White House press secretary Scott McClellan said on Wednesday.
Referring to the planned June 30 transfer of sovereignty to Iraqis, McClellan said "the best way to honor those that lost their lives" is to continue with efforts to bring democracy to Iraq.
US State Department spokesman Adam Ereli said the contractors, all men, "were trying to make a difference and to help others."
BRUSHED OFF: An ambassador to Australia previously said that Beijing does not see a reason to apologize for its naval exercises and military maneuvers in international areas China set off alarm bells in New Zealand when it dispatched powerful warships on unprecedented missions in the South Pacific without explanation, military documents showed. Beijing has spent years expanding its reach in the southern Pacific Ocean, courting island nations with new hospitals, freshly paved roads and generous offers of climate aid. However, these diplomatic efforts have increasingly been accompanied by more overt displays of military power. Three Chinese warships sailed the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand in February, the first time such a task group had been sighted in those waters. “We have never seen vessels with this capability
A Japanese city would urge all smartphone users to limit screen time to two hours a day outside work or school under a proposed ordinance that includes no penalties. The limit — which would be recommended for all residents in Toyoake City — would not be binding and there would be no penalties incurred for higher usage, the draft ordinance showed. The proposal aims “to prevent excessive use of devices causing physical and mental health issues... including sleep problems,” Mayor Masafumi Koki said yesterday. The draft urges elementary-school students to avoid smartphones after 9pm, and junior-high students and older are advised not
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr has fired his national police chief, who gained attention for leading the separate arrests of former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte on orders of the International Criminal Court and televangelist Apollo Carreon Quiboloy, who is on the FBI’s most-wanted list for alleged child sex trafficking. Philippine Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin did not cite a reason for the removal of General Nicolas Torre as head of the 232,000-member national police force, a position he was appointed to by Marcos in May and which he would have held until 2027. He was replaced by another senior police general, Jose
POWER CONFLICT: The US president threatened to deploy National Guards in Baltimore. US media reports said he is also planning to station troops in Chicago US President Donald Trump on Sunday threatened to deploy National Guard troops to yet another Democratic stronghold, the Maryland city of Baltimore, as he seeks to expand his crackdown on crime and immigration. The Republican’s latest online rant about an “out of control, crime-ridden” city comes as Democratic state leaders — including Maryland Governor Wes Moore — line up to berate Trump on a high-profile political stage. Trump this month deployed the National Guard to the streets of Washington, in a widely criticized show of force the president said amounts to a federal takeover of US capital policing. The Guard began carrying
RSS