BAGHDAD — Bombs and bullets took a bloody toll Wednesday, even as military officials reported a sharp fall in attacks over the past year.
Lessening violence has been attributed mainly to the 2007 U.S. troop surge, a Sunni revolt against al-Qaeda in Iraq and government crackdowns on Sunni extremists and Shiite militias. But the U.S. general who led efforts to train Iraq’s army and police units warned Wednesday that progress is mixed and long-term American help will be needed.
An average of 25 attacks took place each day last month, compared with 160 during June 2007, an Iraqi army spokesman, Maj. Gen. Qassim al-Mousawi, said at a news conference Wednesday. He did not provide details on the individual attacks.
Meanwhile, an Associated Press count showed the number of Iraqi civilians and security personnel killed in June was down 66 percent from the same month a year earlier, dropping to 554 from 1,642.
In Washington, U.S. Army Lt. Gen. James Dubik, who oversees training of Iraqi soldiers and police, presented a cautious tone on Iraq’s improved security.
Since he took on that job in June 2007, Iraq’s security forces have grown from 444,000 to 566,000 and are better able to execute operations on their own, Dubik said. But he added that the force still lacks experienced leaders and the ability to train all its new recruits.
In Wednesday’s worst violence, a suicide car bomber killed eight civilians and wounded 41 people in an attack on a military convoy carrying a senior Iraqi commander in Mosul, the Iraqi military said.
Another bomb hit a U.S. convoy, killing one American soldier and wounding two in Samarra, north of Baghdad.
Late Wednesday, a gunman entered a mosque in Baghdad’s Abu Ghraib district and opened fire on worshipers, killing six and wounding eight, a police official said.
