BAGHDAD, 27 June 2003 — Iraqis launched a wave of ambushes against US forces in Iraq and blew up an oil pipeline yesterday. They dropped grenades from an overpass, blew up a vehicle with a roadside bomb and destroyed a civilian SUV traveling with US troops. Two US soldiers and two Iraqi civilians were killed.
Also yesterday, a US military official said two US soldiers and their vehicle had gone missing.
The surge in ambushes came despite assurances that the troops are mopping up resistance. A US military official said the intensifying attacks on US and British troops could be a response to almost two weeks of raids targeting Baath Party loyalists.
Arab Satellite station Al-Jazeera aired a new statement by a group calling itself “the Popular Resistance for the Liberation of Iraq” that urged Arabs and Muslims to join them in “taking revenge” on America.
Six British soldiers were killed in southern Iraq on Tuesday while US Marines came under attack in another southern town, underscoring the spread of anti-US/British violence.
In the latest wave of attacks, a bomb exploded yesterday by a US military vehicle on the road leading to Baghdad’s airport, killing one US soldier and injuring another. The airport road, heavily used by US forces, has been the scene of previous deadly ambushes.
Later, a US Army truck sat smoldering at the side of a highway 30 km (20 miles) south of Baghdad. Witnesses at the scene said it exploded in a fireball as if it had been hit by a rocket-propelled grenade. There were no immediate reports of casualties.
On Wednesday afternoon, ambushers dropped grenades from a Baghdad overpass onto a passing convoy of Army Humvees, said Marine Corps Maj. Sean Gibson. There were no serious injuries.
In Hilla, 70 km (45 miles) south of Baghdad, three Marines were wounded Wednesday in an ambush, a US military statement said. One Marine was killed and two were injured when their vehicle — part of a quick reaction force dispatched in response to the ambush — rolled over on the soft shoulder on the way to the scene.
Yesterday, two Iraqi employees of the national electricity authority were killed when their US-led convoy came under a grenade attack in west Baghdad. US troops evacuated the two bodies from the badly damaged vehicle, which was covered with blood and broken glass.
None of the names of the injured or killed Americans were released.
A senior Iraqi oil official said an oil pipeline was on fire yesterday following an explosion, the sixth in the country in two weeks, near Al-Sitha on the Tigris. Adal Al-Kazaz, director general of Iraq’s Northern Oil Company, said: “I expect the incident to be another act of sabotage.”
