Baghdad, Iraq – Four apparently coordinated bombings in seven minutes today killed 18 people in northern Iraq, ending a relative lull in violence.
A Sunni politician, meanwhile, claimed two insurgent groups were ready to open talks with the government and eventually lay down their arms and join the political process.
The disclosure by Ayham al-Samarie was the first time any Iraqi politician has publicly acknowledged contact with Iraq’s insurgency and could open a new front in efforts to counter the violence.
Hundreds of U.S. and Iraqi soldiers descended on the remote northern city of Tal Afar near the Syrian border, launching a major operation against insurgents, military officials said.
A television station in the United Arab Emirates also aired a video showing gunmen threatening to kill a Turkish hostage.
Two U.S. Marines died Monday after separate roadside bombings near Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, the military said. A U.S. soldier also died of non-combat related injuries Sunday at Camp Dublin, near Baghdad International Airport. At least 1,673 U.S. military members have died since the Iraq war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.
Today’s attacks in northern Iraq, which also left at least 39 wounded, appeared aimed at checkpoints manned by Iraq’s fledgling army, a constant target of militants opposed to the new U.S.-backed government.
The first explosion, caused by a roadside bomb, rocked Hawija, about 40 miles southwest of Kirkuk, at around 9:30 a.m. Soon after, three suicide bombers waiting in cars at army checkpoints to the west and north of Hawija struck in quick succession.
In the deadliest attack, 10 civilians and one soldier were killed at a checkpoint in Dibis, two miles west of Hawija, army Lt. Faleh Ahmed said. Three soldiers and two civilians were killed at a checkpoint in Bagara, three miles west of Hawija. Two soldiers died in a suicide attack on the Aziziya checkpoint at the northern entrance to Hawija.
“I was standing some distance from the checkpoint when I heard a big explosion and I was thrown onto the ground,” Lt. Sadiq Mohammed, 26, whose right leg was wounded, said from his hospital bed. “This is a terrorist act because real resistance should only target American troops, not Iraqis trying to protect their country.” The three car bombs “were coordinated because they happened almost at the same time and in the same way, where the drivers of the suicide cars waited in lines of traffic before reaching the checkpoints before exploding their cars next the soldiers,” police Col. Ahmed Hammoud said.
The Tal Afar offensive was targeting “terror suspects” responsible for multiple attacks on civilians, U.S. Army spokesman Sgt. John Franzen said.
U.S. helicopters flew overhead as tanks and Bradley fighting vehicles patrolled the narrow streets, regularly coming under small arms fire, witnesses said. Tal Afar police Capt. Amjad Hashim said about 20 suspected insurgents had been captured.
Hashim also claimed insurgents fired an anti-aircraft rocket at a U.S. helicopter, striking it and forcing it to return to base.
Franzen said an OH-58 two-seat reconnaissance helicopter had “mechanical difficulties,” but he was unaware if it had been attacked.
The Tal Afar operation came a day after U.S. and Iraqi commanders met with nearly 80 local tribal elders and agreed to “work together to end violence” and rebuild the ancient city’s police and government services, the military said.
Also today, insurgents attacked a convoy of civilian contractors delivering supplies for coalition forces, and U.S. troops cordoned off the area in Habaniyah, 50 miles west of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. No further details were provided.
More than 860 people have died since the Shiite-led government was announced April 28.
Iraqi and U.S. officials maintain that a counterinsurgency offensive in Baghdad, dubbed Operation Lightning, has helped curb attacks in the capital, where multiple suicide car bombings and drive-by shootings have become part of daily life.
The operation, which began May 22, is the biggest Iraqi-led offensive since Saddam Hussein’s ouster two years ago. Before it began, authorities controlled only eight of Baghdad’s 23 entrances.
Now, all are under government control.
At least 887 arrests have been made in the operation, according to government figures, and 608 mobile and 194 permanent checkpoints have been established.
Sunni Arab Islamic extremists opposed to the new Shiite-led government and former Saddam loyalists, who lost power following the former dictator’s ouster, are believed to be major players in the rampant insurgency.
Al-Samarie, who has dual U.S.-Iraqi citizenship, said the Islamic Army in Iraq and the Mujahedeen Army, the Arabic for holy warriors were ready to open talks. He said he had not met any of their field commanders but began contacting their political leaders about five months ago. He did not name the leaders.
It was not possible to verify his claims and the government would not comment on them.
He told AP the two factions represented more than half of the “resistance,” the term used by many in Iraq to exclude militant Muslim groups working with Jordanian-born Abu Musab al-Zarqawi of al-Qaeda in Iraq and others who target civilians as well as Iraq’s security forces.
Al-Samarie, a former interim electricity minister, said that no agreement had been reached for the two groups to lay down their weapons or declare a cease-fire, but that a limited truce could possibly be arranged to prove their goodwill after talks get under way.
The Islamic Army in Iraq has claimed responsibility for several attacks and is believed to be responsible for kidnapping and killing several of the more than 200 foreigners taken hostage in Iraq in the past 18 months. Little is known about the Mujahedeen Army.
The video aired by the private Dubai television station showed gunmen pointing automatic rifles at the head of a kidnapped Turkish businessman, threatening to kill him unless Ankara stops supporting U.S. forces and prevents Turkish businesses from operating in Iraq.
A passport held up by the hostage in the video contained a birth date and place of birth that matched that of 48-year-old Turkish businessman Ali Musluoglu, who was abducted in Baghdad on May 19.
In Ankara, Turkey’s Foreign Ministry did not comment.
In other developments:
-Sunni cleric Salam al-Kardici, 50, who was kidnapped Sunday by armed men in police uniforms, was found shot to death beneath a bridge in the southern city of Basra.
-A riot broke out late Sunday at the U.S.-run Abu Ghraib prison west of Baghdad during a failed escape attempt by an Iraqi inmate during a heavy sandstorm, the military said today. Detainees threw rocks at portable light generators and guards before the unrest was quelled, with four guards and six inmates slightly injured.
