Iraq

Mortars kill 22 detainees in U.S.-run Iraqi prison

BAGHDAD - Guerrillas fired a barrage of mortar rounds at Baghdad's largest prison Tuesday, killing 22 prisoners.

A U.S. soldier was killed by a roadside bomb in the northern city of Mosul, the 100th American combat death in April, the deadliest month since the U.S.-led invasion began in March 2003.

And three of four bodies found near an attack on a fuel convoy in Iraq this month were contract workers for Halliburton Co., the company said Tuesday.

"This isn't the first time that we have seen this kind of attack. We don't know if they are trying to inspire an uprising or a prison break," Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt said.

All of the casualties were security detainees, meaning they were suspected of involvement in the anti-U.S. insurgency or of being part of Saddam Hussein's ousted regime. The prison houses about 5,000 security prisoners.

U.S. Marines patrolling Baghdad discovered the area the mortars were fired from, but the insurgents had fled, Morgenthaler said.

The attack was the bloodiest against the sprawling prison complex in western Baghdad. In August, six security prisoners were killed in a mortar attack on the lockup, which was once Hussein's most notorious prison.

Halliburton identified its dead workers as Stephen Hulett, 48, of Manistee, Mich.; Jack Montague, 52, of Pittsburg, Ill.; and Jeffery Parker, 45, of Lake Charles, La., and called them "brave hearts without medals, humanitarians without parades and heroes without statues."

The fourth body has not been identified, Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said. Kimmitt said one of the four bodies had been identified as a non-American, but he would not give the nationality.

Hulett, Montague, Parker and Hamill were among seven employees of Halliburton subsidiary KBR, formerly known as Kellogg, Brown & Root, missing since an April 9 attack on their convoy west of Baghdad.

In addition to the 100th American killed, four U.S. soldiers were wounded in the roadside bombing in Mosul, Lt. Col. Joseph Piek said. Three Iraqi civilians also were wounded, he said.

In Washington, Pentagon officials told Congress on Tuesday that U.S. troops and the Iraqi military will serve under U.S. command after political power is turned over to an Iraqi interim government on June 30.

Strongly suggesting the United States will maintain command of the military in Iraq indefinitely, even as it trains an Iraqi fighting force, Deputy Defense Secretary Paul Wolfowitz told the Senate Armed Services Committee Iraqi troops displayed an "intangible fear" in recent weeks as insurgents attacked across Iraq.

Wolfowitz and Gen. Richard Myers, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, left open the possibility that more U.S. troops might be sent to Iraq to restore stability and give the Iraqi interim government a chance to survive after June 30.

Also Tuesday, Iraqi security forces, some wearing flak jackets and carrying weapons, moved back into the besieged city of Fallujah, part of an agreement between U.S. officials and local leaders aimed at ending hostilities. The accord calls on insurgents to hand in their weapons and allows civilians to return.

U.S. officials have warned that if guerrillas do not surrender their weapons, Marines are prepared to storm the city.

"If the peaceful track does not play itself out . . . major hostilities will resume on short notice," U.S. spokesman Dan Senor said.

Fallujah was largely peaceful Tuesday, and there were cars filled with returning Iraqi police at a U.S. checkpoint.

Iraqi families also lined up at the checkpoint. As part of a deal announced Monday, the U.S. military agreed to let 50 families a day back into the city, but the lines at the checkpoint were so long Tuesday that about 150 people had to be turned away, said Capt. Ed Sullivan.

Kimmitt acknowledged Tuesday that U.S. soldiers shot and killed two Iraqis working for the U.S.-funded Al-Iraqiya television station a day earlier, but said the two had been filming a military checkpoint in the central city of Samarra and failed to stop despite repeated warning shots.

Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez, the top commander of U.S. forces in Iraq, visited soldiers outside Najaf on Tuesday and indicated there were no immediate plans to storm the southern city and end a standoff with anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who controls a large militia. Najaf is home to Iraq's holiest Shiite shrine.

"The issue of Sadr is bigger than Sadr. It's about the Shiites and the holy shrines. That's the challenge I have," Sanchez said.

Also Tuesday, U.S. and coalition military leaders were working to fill the gap left by the decision of Spain and Honduras to withdraw their troops.

Kimmitt said existing troops could be shifted to new positions, patrol areas could be redrawn or new troops could be brought in. Spanish and Honduran troops are mostly based in or around Najaf.

- Information from McClatchy Newspapers was used in this report.

World and national headlines

© 2006 • All Rights Reserved • St. Petersburg Times 490 First Avenue South • St. Petersburg, FL 33701 • 727-893-8111 Contact the Times | Privacy Policy Standard of Accuracy | Terms, Conditions & Copyright