BAGHDAD, 6 September 2005 — Insurgents launched a daring daylight assault yesterday against Iraq’s Interior Ministry, killing two police in an upsurge in insurgent attacks, some of them by Al-Qaeda’s wing in Iraq. Two British soldiers died in a roadside bombing in the south.
US Marines announced yesterday that Al-Qaeda’s Iraq wing launched multiple attacks the day before against US and Iraqi targets in Hit, 140 kilometers (85 miles) west of Baghdad. Twelve people, including eight civilians, died in the Hit attacks, including three suicide bombers.
Elsewhere, at least eight Iraqi civilians — including five children — were killed in fighting yesterday in the northern city of Tal Afar, said Dr. Abdul-Aal Kamal of the Tal Afar hospital. There was no report of casualties among the combatants, including the US 3rd Armored Cavalry Regiment which is trying to wrest control of Tal Afar, 420 kilometers (260 miles) north of Baghdad, from insurgents and foreign fighters.
However, Iraqi authorities said the bodies of three community leaders who had refused insurgent demands for help were found yesterday in the city. Iraqi officers said gunmen swept through the victims’ districts over the weekend as fighting around the city escalated.
In Baghdad, thunderous explosions and volleys of heavy gunfire rattled the downtown area soon after sunrise yesterday as about four carloads of insurgents staged a lightning raid on the Interior Ministry, which is responsible for police and paramilitary units nationwide. The insurgents, who fired automatic weapons and rocket-propelled grenades, withdrew after about 15 minutes, leaving two policemen dead and five wounded. There was no report of insurgent casualties.
A statement posted yesterday on a website claimed responsibility for the attack in the name of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, led by Jordanian terror mastermind Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi.
US Apache and Black Hawk helicopters flew over central Baghdad after the firefight, and US Army patrols in armored vehicles combed the streets looking for the attackers.
The two British soldiers died when their armored Land Rover was destroyed by a bomb near Zubeir, a Sunni enclave about 20 kilometers (12 miles) west of Basra. The deaths brought to 95 the number of British military personnel killed in Iraq.
Elsewhere, Iraqi officials said Al-Qaeda-linked foreign fighters had taken control of large parts of Qaim, 320 kilometers (200 miles) west of Baghdad.
