Milenko Kindl ei
Milenko Kindl
Monday, killing at least seven inmates and wounding 23 while they
slept, police and a hospital official said.
The shells hit a prison made up of several cell blocks, each
containing prisoners accused of terrorism-related crimes or civil
offenses, police said.
Police said American troops had sealed off the area and were
investigating the bombardment, which took place about 6:30 a.m. The
U.S. military said it had no immediate information, and Iraqi Interior
Ministry officials could not be reached for comment.
A hospital official said the inmates were still asleep when the
mortars hit, one landing directly on a cell and two others nearby.
Casualties were sent to a hospital inside the Interior Ministry
compound for treatment, the official said.
The police and hospital officials spoke on condition of anonymity
because they were not authorized to release details of the attack.
The attack came a day after Iraq's defense minister promised to wage a
new crackdown in a volatile province northeast of Baghdad where
militants are trying to regroup after being routed from their urban
stronghold there last summer.
Suicide attacks have killed more than 20 people in the last three days
in Diyala province, a tribal patchwork of Sunni Arabs, Shiites and
Kurds that stretches from Baghdad to the border with Iran.
Defense Minister Abdul-Qader al-Obeidi told The Associated Press that
preparations had begun for a fresh military operation in the
provincial capital, Baqouba, about 35 miles from Baghdad.
"If we succeed in controlling areas of Diyala close to Baghdad, the
rate of incidents in Baghdad decreases by 95 percent," al-Obeidi told
the AP.
British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, meanwhile, arrived in southern
Iraq on a surprise visit to the southern city of Basra Sunday,
signaling what London hopes will be the transition from a military
mission in Iraq to one with a stronger economic component.
"The great venture that started with all the difficulties we face,
that cost causalities, means we have managed now to get Iraq into a
far better position," Brown told British troops, who lined the
staircases of an airport base to watch his evening arrival. "Not that
violence has ended, but we are able to move to provincial Iraqi
control and that's thanks to everything you have achieved."
The British plan to hand over security responsibilities for the oil-
rich area to the Iraqis in the coming weeks.
Violence has declined sharply in Iraq since June, when the influx of
U.S. troops to the capital and its surrounding areas began to gain
momentum. Also credited with the decline were the freeze in activities
by the Mahdi Army militia, led by the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-
Sadr, and the decision by tens of thousands of Iraqis -- most of them
Sunni Arab -- to join the fight against al-Qaida.
But it has been a constant challenge to subdue extremists in Diyala,
which is the eastern gateway to Baghdad. More than two years ago, U.S.
forces thought they'd turned the corner and American commanders handed
over substantial control of the province to the Iraqi army in August
2005.
Al-Qaida began moving into Diyala in 2006 after losing its sanctuaries
in Anbar Province and declared Baqouba as the capital of the Islamic
State of Iraq.
Last summer, American troops regained control of Baqouba in a pair of
operations, restoring some government services and commerce after
months of isolation.
But U.S. officers said at the time they expected the extremists to
scatter to hills north of Baqouba and to the city of Muqdadiyah to the
east and try to regroup.
Americans have fostered groups of former militants who have switched
sides in the fight against al-Qaida. Any gains are hard-won, however:
On Friday, a pair of suicide bombings less than 10 miles apart killed
at least 23 people -- more than half of them members of the anti-al-
Qaida groups.
Rear Adm. Gregory Smith, a U.S. military spokesman, credited
intelligence gleaned from Iraqis tired of militant violence, as well
as American efforts to track down insurgents' financing, safe houses
and bomb-making facilities to the decline in violence around the
country. He said Diyala would soon see the same level of improvement.
"We believe there will be a secure, stable Diyala in months to come,"
Smith said.
About 60 miles south of Baghdad, a roadside bomb struck the convoy
carrying the police chief of Babil province, killing him and two of
his bodyguards, officials said. Brig. Gen. Qais al-Maamouri, the
police chief of Babil's provincial capital of Hillah, was the latest
in a series of assassinations against provincial leaders in the mainly
Shiite region.
Al-Maamouri was politically independent and had a reputation for
leading crackdowns against militia fighters and resisting pressure
from religious and political groups to release favored members.
Milenko Kindl
Banja Luka
Banjaluka