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Insurgents destroy another bridge in Iraq

An Iraqi child, dressed in a costume as a white dove symbolizing peace, performs during the fourth anniversary of Iraq's most powerful militia, the Mahdi Army, in the Shiite enclave of Sadr City in Baghdad on Monday. The writing on the fingers on the poster in the back read, from the top, ``Terrorism, Sectarianism, Occupation.'' PHOTO: AP

Suspected Sunni militants bombed and badly damaged a span over the main north-south highway leading from Baghdad yesterday -- the third bridge attack in as many days in an apparent campaign against key transportation arteries.

The attack occurred 60km south of Baghdad and just 10km south of a bridge brought down on Sunday by what was believed to be a suicide truck bomber. Three US soldiers guarding that bridge were killed in Sunday's blast.

The explosion at 7:30am yesterday -- not thought to be a suicide bomb -- struck a bridge linking the villages of al-Qariya al-Asriyah and al-Rashayed in northern Babil province. No injuries were reported.

About 60 percent of the bridge was damaged, and cars could still pass over it via one lane, police said. But debris from the blast fell on the main north-south expressway below, further complicating efforts to reopen that main artery, closed after Sunday's blast dropped masses of concrete onto the roadway.

Fierce clashes broke out between joint US-Iraqi forces and al-Qaeda militants in the city yesterday morning, leaving two Iraqi soldiers and six militants dead, police and hospital officials said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of security concerns.

The fighting also prevented university students at nearby colleges from taking their final exams, the provincial police center said.

Elsewhere in the province, gunmen stormed the house of the Sunni mayor of Muqdadiyah, about 90km north of Baghdad, forcing the family members outside, then blowing up the house, police officials said.

Najim al-Harbi, a member of the Iraq Islamic Party, was not home when the attack took place.

The al-Qaeda front group Islamic State in Iraq, meanwhile, posted a video showing what it said were 14 captive members of the Iraqi security forces and threatening to kill them in 72 hours if their demands were not met, including the release of all female prisoners in Iraqi prisons. The hostages were shown in uniform standing in three rows; one of them repeatedly sighed and looked up at the ceiling. It wasn't clear when they were seized.

Meanwhile, the US military yesterday said its troops had seized a bomb-making factory in eastern Baghdad capable of manufacturing more than 300 roadside bombs.

The factory, a cluster of small buildings, was discovered in the thick palm groves of Baghdad's eastern Rashid neighborhood on Monday, the military said.

The soldiers have taken more than "300 improvised explosive devices off the streets," a statement quoted US commander Colonel Ricky Gibbs as saying.

The find consisted of one vehicle wired and packed with explosives, dozens of mortars, one 230kg bomb, hundreds of grenades and projectiles and hundreds of cans of nitric acid used to make crude bombs.
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