U.S. says 20 gunmen killed in Baghdad battle
Wed Apr 11, 2007 10:51 AM BST
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Colvin
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - At least 20 suspected gunmen were killed in a
fierce day-long battle between U.S. and Iraqi troops in central Baghdad
on Tuesday in which 16 U.S. soldiers were also wounded, the U.S.
military said on Wednesday.
Residents of Fadhil district, a violent
Sunni insurgent stronghold on the east bank of the Tigris River and the
scene of Tuesday's fighting, held funeral processions to bury the bodies
of 15 men at the nearby Adhamiya cemetery
The U.S. military said the battle erupted after gunmen fired on U.S. and
Iraqi troops during a routine search operation. The fighting quickly
escalated and two U.S. helicopters were hit by ground fire and had to
return to base.
It was the worst outbreak of violence since U.S. and Iraqi forces
launched a major security crackdown in the capital two months ago aimed
at curbing rampant sectarian violence that threatens to plunge Iraq into
full-scale civil war.
U.S. military spokesman Lieutenant-Colonel Christopher Garver said an
estimated 20 gunmen had been killed. The army initially put the toll at
three. He also said that 13 of the 16 wounded American soldiers had
since returned to duty.
An Iraqi policeman at the nearby al-Numan hospital said the hospital had
received 30 people with wounds of varying severity.
Fadhil was reported to be quiet on Wednesday, but residents
taking part in two funeral processions down the main street of the
district were angry.
They denounced the Shi'ite-led government and said those slain
were innocent and one old man threw his slippers at a passing patrol of
three U.S. vehicles, witnesses said.
"They were shouting and demanding the government compensate families of
the slain people and pay money to those whose homes had been damaged," a
local journalist and resident Abu Omar said.
Abu Omar told Reuters on Tuesday he saw a U.S. attack helicopter open
fire on gunmen holed up in one house.
While Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki continued his Asian trip to boost
relations with Japan and South Korea, he was also having to deal with
tensions with neighbours Turkey and Iran.
Iran, which refused to allow his plane to fly through its airspace on
his way to Japan, said on Wednesday it may not attend a conference on
Iraq next month if U.S. forces do not release five Iranians they are
holding, a newspaper reported.
Iran last week warned Iraq that its failure to secure the release of the
five, who Washington says were linked to Iran's Revolutionary Guards,
would impair relations. Iran says the five are diplomats and denies the
charges.
"We have reminded Iraqi officials that as long as the Iranian diplomats
are not freed, Iran's participation at any conference about Iraq with
the presence of America will face a serious problem and obstacle," Abbas
Araghchi, a senior Foreign Ministry official, told Iran's hardline
Kayhan daily.
Maliki was also forced to mollify neighbour Turkey after the leader of
Iraq's largely autonomous northern Kurdish region angered Ankara by
saying if Turkey interfered in Kurdistan, Iraqi Kurds would interfere in
Kurdish cities in Turkey.
(Additional reporting by Ahmed Rasheed and Aseel Kami in Baghdad and
Edmund Blair in Tehran)