- BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The U.S.
postwar combat death toll in Iraq climbed past the number of soldiers killed
during the invasion when the U.S. military said Wednesday it had lost two
more dead in a roadside bomb north of Baghdad.
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- Their deaths brought to 116 the number of U.S. troops
killed in hostilities since President Bush declared major combat over on
May 1, surpassing the 115 killed in the war launched on March 20 to topple
Saddam Hussein.
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- The somber statistic -- no reliable figures are available
for the many more Iraqis killed in the conflict -- underlines the scale
of the resistance that U.S. forces have stirred since they burst into Iraq
more than seven months ago.
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- A spokesman for the U.S. Army's 4th Infantry Division
said the two soldiers died and one was wounded when their vehicle hit an
explosive device about 120 km (75 miles) north of Baghdad late Tuesday.
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- Guerrillas have not aimed only at U.S. troops who spearheaded
the invasion that Bush said was to protect the world from Iraq's so far
unfound weapons of mass destruction.
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- Three land mine blasts wounded seven Ukrainian soldiers,
part of a Polish-led multinational division operating south of Baghdad,
Tuesday. A Ukraine Defense Ministry spokesman said the mines had hit two
armored vehicles during a night patrol.
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- Those fighting the U.S.-led occupation seem determined
to spread chaos, foil reconstruction efforts and punish foreigners and
Iraqis seen as linked to the Americans.
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- Monday, suicide bombers blasted the headquarters of the
Red Cross and three stations of the U.S.-backed police, killing 35 people
and wounding more than 200, a day after attackers rocketed a fortress hotel
where U.S. Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz was staying, killing
a U.S. soldier.
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- A car bomber targeted a police station in Falluja, west
of the capital, Tuesday, killing at least four people.
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- RED CROSS The Geneva-based International Committee of
the Red Cross (ICRC) was to hold a news conference at 3 p.m. GMT in response
to the attack on its offices, which has forced other humanitarian agencies
to agonize over how they can operate in Iraq.
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- The ICRC's spokeswoman in Baghdad, Nada Doumani, has
said it will not quit Iraq after 23 years of uninterrupted work, but has
not ruled out a further cut in international staff.
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- Bush has blamed "foreign terrorists" and forces
loyal to Saddam for the unrelenting violence.
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- "The foreign terrorists are trying to create conditions
of fear and retreat because they fear a free and peaceful state in the
midst of a part of the world where terror has found recruits," Bush
said Tuesday.
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- Many Iraqis say it is the U.S. occupation that has fueled
nationalist resistance and attracted foreign militants keen to wage a jihad,
or holy war, against American troops.
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- "How many Iraqis were involved in terror attacks
against U.S. targets, or in terror attacks around the world, before 2003?"
asked political science professor Saad Jawad, from Baghdad University.
"Was Iraq a terror base before the invasion? Look at it now."
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- No supporter of Saddam, Jawad said the deposed dictator
had stamped hard on any suspected Islamist militants. "The U.S.-UK
invasion opened our doors wide for anyone to enter Iraq."
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- Bush, seeking re-election next year amid criticism from
some over his Iraq policies, said he expected Syria and Iran to enforce
border controls to stop infiltrators.
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- Syria Wednesday condemned the Red Cross bombing as a
terrorist act that damaged the interests of the Iraqi people.
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- Many Iraqis also believe foreigners are behind the wave
of suicide bombings on mainly civilian targets in Baghdad.
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- Gesturing angrily at the pockmarked ICRC buildings, where
a dozen Iraqis died in Monday's bombing, Yassen Saeed shook his head.
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- "They are criminals. Syrians, Palestinians and Jordanians
from the Arab world. Iraqis wouldn't do this," said Saeed, a retired
oil worker whose son was wounded in the attack.
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- A spokesman for the Iraqi National Congress, a former
exile opposition group close to the Pentagon, said only Iraqis could solve
the security nightmare in and around Baghdad.
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- "Put security completely in the hands of Iraqi paramilitary
forces, Iraqi security forces," Entifadh Qanbar told Reuters. "Iraqis
will be able to find those bastards."
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- He said Iraqi police felt the Americans were interfering
and holding them back in the hunt for "the bad guys."
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