BAGHDAD, 9 December 2006 — Iraqi officials said five children were killed in a US airstrike yesterday which the US military said killed 20 suspected Al-Qaeda militants.
Grieving relatives near Ishaqi, 90 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad, showed the bodies of five children wrapped in blankets to journalists. Houses, surrounded by open fields, were flattened in the raid and police said they found the bodies of 17 civilians.
Complaints that unjustified killings by US troops are common have soured Iraqis’ sentiment toward the US presence in Iraq. Earlier this year Shiite Prime Minister Nuri Al-Maliki said he was losing patience over such reports.
The US military said ground forces with air support struck in an area north of Baghdad where the Sunni Arab insurgency is strong. Police and officials said the bodies of 17 civilians were found in the rubble of two homes.
“The Americans have done this before but they always deny it,” Ishaqi Mayor Amer Alwan said by telephone. “I want the world to know what’s happening here.” In a statement, the US military said the operation in Salahaddin province followed intelligence reports that indicated Al-Qaeda militants operated in the area. It said rocket- propelled grenades and explosive suicide vests were found.
Only a handful of complaints involving civilian deaths have led to criminal investigations by the US military.
Maliki has tried to show independence from his Washington backers by criticizing recent US raids and by demanding a bigger say in command decisions. But he is heavily dependent on the firepower of 140,000 US troops battling Sunni insurgents and soaring sectarian violence.
In the largest operation of its kind since the US invasion, British and Danish troops backed by tanks seized five suspects accused of attacks on coalition forces in the southern city of Basra, the British military said. Some 1,000 troops, including amphibious assault teams, launched pre-dawn raids on five homes in the densely populated northern Al-Hartha district of Basra, where rival Shiite militias are battling for control of the city’s oil wealth.
Britain has around 7,200 troops in southern Iraq. It hopes to pull out thousands next year and hand over control of Basra to Iraqi authorities in April.
In the village of Jalameda, near Ishaqi, 90 km (50 miles) north of the capital, police said they found the bodies of 17 dead civilians in the rubble of the family homes of brothers Mohammed Hussein Jalmoud and Mahmoud Hussein Jalmoud.
Grieving relatives showed the bodies of five children wrapped in blankets to journalists.
Capt. Nasser Abdul Majeed said that the 17 included six women and five children. They had been sent to the regional capital Tikrit to determine the cause of death. The houses, surrounded by open fields, were flattened in the raid, leaving little but rubble and twisted steel rods.
