Baghdad, Iraq – Five U.S. Marines were killed by a roadside bomb blast in western Iraq, the military said today.
They died Wednesday after their vehicle was attacked near Ramadi, 70 miles west of Baghdad. They were not identified pending notification of their families. The five were assigned to the 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force.
Also Wednesday, Iraqi troops rescued a kidnapped Australian contractor during a raid in the capital, officials announced, while a suicide bomber killed at least 23 Iraqi soldiers at a mess hall north of the capital during another violent day across Iraq.
The suicide bomber, wearing an Iraqi army uniform, penetrated security and detonated an explosives belt in the middle of a lunchtime crowd at a base in Khalis, 40 miles north of Baghdad. Thirty-eight soldiers were injured.
“The suicide attacker must be a member of the army,” said one wounded soldier being transferred by ambulance to a hospital in nearby Baqubah. “It’s very difficult for strangers to get into the base.”
Douglas Wood, a 63-year-old Australian engineer who lives in Alamo, Calif., was freed Sunday after 47 days in captivity. Wood, who suffers from heart trouble, appeared haggard but happy in photographs displayed at a news conference.
Iraqi forces discovered him underneath a blanket with his hands bound in a building housing suspected insurgents. The residents said Wood was an ailing relative, an Australian diplomat told reporters.
Iraqi officials and an Army military adviser said soldiers stumbled onto Wood while conducting a routine search in Ghazaliya, a neighborhood in northwest Baghdad where insurgent sympathizers are known to live.
Soldiers also freed an Iraqi contractor held with Wood and detained three suspected insurgents. Wood was handed over to U.S. medical personnel, who examined him at Camp Liberty, near the Baghdad airport.
Wood has told investigators two Iraqis kidnapped with him April 30 were moved away about a week and a half after their abduction, said Australian diplomat Nick Warren.
