Insurgents killed four US Marines in a landmine strike in Anbar Province west of Baghdad, in one of the deadliest attacks against US troops in the Sunni former rebel bastion in months, the military said yesterday.
The Marines were in a vehicle which was hit by an improvised explosive device on Friday, the military said in a statement, without specifying the exact location of the attack.
The attack came 10 days after a similar ambush in the province in which two US Marines were killed and three wounded.
PHOTO: AP
Friday’s attack brought to 1,290 the US military’s losses in Anbar since the March 2003 invasion, figures on independent Web site www.icasualties.org showed, slightly fewer than the 1,298 killed in Baghdad.
The losses in Anbar make up nearly a third of the 4,071 US troops killed in the conflict so far.
Most of the US dead in Anbar have been killed by roadside bombs.
The vast desert province that borders Saudi Arabia, Syria and Jordan was one of the strongholds of the anti-US insurgency in the first years after the overthrow of former Iraqi president Saddam Hussein’s regime.
Its provincial capital of Ramadi and the nearby city of Fallujah became symbols of Sunni Arab resistance to US forces in Iraq.
In one of the fiercest battles of the war so far, US forces virtually razed Fallujah to the ground in November 2004 in a devastating offensive to recapture the city from insurgents.
That month saw 137 US troops killed across Iraq — the highest monthly figure till now — most of them in the Fallujah battle.
Violence in the province fell dramatically last year as Sunni Arab tribes fell out with al-Qaeda and joined the US-led war against the jihadist network.
As the sun sets on another scorching Yangon day, the hot and bothered descend on the Myanmar city’s parks, the coolest place to spend an evening during yet another power blackout. A wave of exceptionally hot weather has blasted Southeast Asia this week, sending the mercury to 45°C and prompting thousands of schools to suspend in-person classes. Even before the chaos and conflict unleashed by the military’s 2021 coup, Myanmar’s creaky and outdated electricity grid struggled to keep fans whirling and air conditioners humming during the hot season. Now, infrastructure attacks and dwindling offshore gas reserves mean those who cannot afford expensive diesel
Does Argentine President Javier Milei communicate with a ghost dog whose death he refuses to accept? Forced to respond to questions about his mental health, the president’s office has lashed out at “disrespectful” speculation. Twice this week, presidential spokesman Manuel Adorni was asked about Milei’s English Mastiff, Conan, said to have died seven years ago. Milei, 53, had Conan cloned, and today is believed to own four copies he refers to as “four-legged children.” Or is it five? In an interview with CNN this month, Milei referred to his five dogs, whose faces and names he had engraved on the presidential baton. Conan,
French singer Kendji Girac, who was seriously injured by a gunshot this week, wanted to “fake” his suicide to scare his partner who was threatening to leave him, prosecutors said on Thursday. The 27-year-old former winner of France’s version of The Voice was found wounded after police were called to a traveler camp in Biscarrosse on France’s southwestern coast. Girac told first responders he had accidentally shot himself while tinkering with a Colt .45 automatic pistol he had bought at a junk shop, a source said. On Thursday, regional prosecutor Olivier Janson said, citing the singer, that he wanted to “fake” his suicide
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi reaffirmed his pledge to replace India’s religion-based marriage and inheritance laws with a uniform civil code if he returns to office for a third term, a move that some minority groups have opposed. In an interview with the Times of India listing his agenda, Modi said his government would push for making the code a reality. “It is clear that separate laws for communities are detrimental to the health of society,” he said in the interview published yesterday. “We cannot be a nation where one community is progressing with the support of the Constitution while the other