Four soldiers injured in ambush

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Four U.S. soldiers conducting a public-health assessment were wounded Sunday morning when their Humvees were ambushed in downtown Baghdad, a U.S. military spokesman said.

The soldiers, in two Humvees, were stopped in midmorning traffic when an assailant approached and fired at them from a small-caliber weapon, said Capt. David Connolly, a military spokesman in Baghdad.

One of the soldiers' injuries were serious, he said without elaborating.

"There are still some small pockets of resistance in Baghdad," Connolly said.

He did not know whether the soldiers returned fire or whether the shooter was caught.

The soldiers were taken to a combat support hospital. Their names were being withheld until their families could be notified.

WASHINGTON - The Bush administration will use the weight of its military victory in Iraq as leverage to press Syria to curtail support of terrorist groups, primarily the Iranian-backed group Hezbollah, the Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times reported, quoting unnamed administration officials.

The request will call for shutting down terrorist training camps and halting cargo flights from Tehran to Damascus that allegedly carry weapons, personnel and other supplies for Hezbollah, which operates in southern Lebanon under Syrian authority, the unnamed officials said. The U.S. also will ask Syria to close the Damascus offices of terrorist organizations.

The new demands are likely to be delivered by Secretary of State Colin Powell, who is expected to visit Damascus early next month. The United States may also demand that Syrian troops withdraw from Lebanon, a Syrian client state.

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Radio broadcasts by the U.S.-led military coalition offered a reward Sunday to Iraqis who hand over antiquities stolen from Iraqi museums or provide information about the looters.

In a message read on Information Radio, which is broadcast in Iraq by coalition forces, an announcer said antiquities handed over to coalition forces would be taken to Iraqi museums.

"Coalition forces want to guarantee these antiquities for every Iraqi," the announcer said. "The captured antiquities will be given back to the people of Iraq."

Anyone who helps in finding the antiquities will get a "reward for returning these invaluable historic objects," the coalition broadcasts said without specifying what the reward might be.

TEHRAN, Iran - Shiite clerics are streaming from Iran to the holy cities of Najaf and Karbala, Iraq's major Shiite teaching centers, in the wake of Saddam Hussein's downfall.

"In recent days, hundreds of students, mostly Iraqis, studying at Iran's religious seminaries, have begun returning to Iraq to continue their religious studies at Najaf and Karbala," one cleric, Iraqi-born Mohammad Hussein al-Haeri, said Sunday in Tehran.

Al-Haeri said the exodus of clerics to Iraq should not be seen as a campaign by Shiite clerics to seize power and run Iraq with a religious government.

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia - Saudi Arabia launched a telethon Sunday to raise money for Iraqis affected by the U.S.-led war, the official Saudi Press Agency said.

More than $9.2-million was raised in the first seven hours, the agency reported.

The telethon, which was called by the oil-rich state's King Fahd, was held as part of Saudi Arabia's commitment to help Muslims all over the world, Saudi Interior Minister Prince Nayef told state-run television.

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