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Iraq

U.S.: Offensive kills up to 100 rebels

BAGHDAD - Hundreds of U.S. Marines pushed through a lawless region on the Syrian frontier Tuesday after battling past well-armed militants fighting from basements, rooftops and sandbag bunkers. Insurgents kidnapped the provincial governor as a bargaining chip.

As many as 100 insurgents were killed in the first 48 hours of Operation Matador, as American troops cleared villages along the meandering Euphrates, then crossed in rafts and on a pontoon bridge, the U.S. command said. Many of the dead remained trapped under rubble after attack planes and helicopter gunships pounded their hideouts.

At least three Marines were reported killed and 20 wounded during the first three days of the offensive - the biggest U.S. operation since Fallujah was taken from extremists six months ago.

The operation was launched after U.S. intelligence showed followers of Iraq's most wanted terrorist, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, took refuge in the remote desert region, a haven for smugglers and insurgent suppliers. The fighters were believed to have fled to Anbar province after losses in Iraqi cities.

After intense fighting with militants entrenched on the south bank of the Euphrates River early in the operation, Marines saw only light resistance Tuesday and advanced through sparsely populated settlements along a 12-mile stretch to the border with Syria, said a Chicago Tribune reporter embedded with the assault, James Janega.

Gunmen kidnapped Anbar's governor Tuesday morning and told his family that he would be released only when U.S. forces withdrew from Qaim, the town 200 miles west of Baghdad where the offensive began late Saturday. Gov. Raja Nawaf Farhan al-Mahalawi was seized as he drove from Qaim to the provincial capital of Ramadi, said his brother, Hammad.

Lt. Col. Steven Boylan, a spokesman for U.S. forces in Iraq, said: "We don't respond to insurgent or terrorist demands."

At least three Marines were reported killed and 20 wounded during the first three days of Operation Matador. The U.S. command said as many as 100 insurgents died in the first 48 hours - many of them trapped under rubble as attack planes and helicopter gunships pounded their hideouts.

At the Pentagon, Marine Lt. Gen. James T. Conway, director of operations for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told reporters Tuesday that the assault in the northern Jazirah Desert had run into well-equipped and trained fighters.

"There are reports that these people are in uniforms, in some cases are wearing protective vests, and there's some suspicion that their training exceeds what we have seen with other engagements further east," he said.

Marine commanders in the field told the Chicago Tribune that militants put up an unexpectedly intense fight in villages dotting the Euphrates as it snakes across the desert toward the Syrian border.

As troops erected a pontoon bridge Sunday, mortar fire began to fall on them from the nearby town of Obeidi, 185 miles west of Baghdad, the Tribune said.

Navy and Marine F/A-18 Hornet strike jets strafed the tree line and Marine Cobra attack helicopters fired rockets into insurgent hideouts, the Tribune said.

When Marines entered the town Sunday, they found insurgents prepared for battle. Sandbag bunkers stood in front of some houses, and gunmen fired from rooftops and balconies, said a Los Angeles Times reporter also embedded with the troops.

Insurgents attacked a Marine convoy late Monday near a U.S. base in Qaim with small arms, rocket-propelled grenades, roadside bombs and two suicide car bombs, a Marine spokesman, Capt. Jeffrey Pool, said. One explosion damaged a Humvee, and a suicide car bomber was destroyed by a Marine tank. No Marines were killed and 10 insurgents surrendered in the incident, Pool said.

Residents reached by telephone in the area reported some fighting Tuesday in Obeidi and the two nearby towns of Rommana and Karabilah. They said residents were taking advantage of the relative lull to flee the Qaim area.

Intelligence reports indicated insurgents were using the region, a known smuggling route, as a staging area where foreign fighters cross into Iraq from Syria and receive weapons and equipment for attacks in Baghdad, Ramadi, Fallujah and other cities, Pool said.

The U.S. offensive comes amid a surge of militant attacks that have targeted the U.S. military and Iraqi security forces and civilians, since the country's first democratically elected government was announced April 28.

At least two car bombs exploded Tuesday in downtown Baghdad, targeting U.S. and Iraqi troops. At least nine Iraqis were killed and 19 wounded, the Interior Ministry said. One of the bombs wounded three American soldiers, a U.S. military spokeswoman, Capt. Kelly Lewis, said.

Also Tuesday, Iraq's Parliament appointed a 55-member committee of legislators from the country's Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish groups to draft a new constitution. Political leaders have until Aug. 15 to complete the charter, which would then be voted on in a national referendum.

ITALY: Italy's foreign minister suggested Tuesday that Italian troops would remain in Iraq until at least early next year despite renewed domestic pressures for withdrawal after the killing of an Italian intelligence agent by U.S. soldiers in Baghdad. Premier Silvio Berlusconi had previously said Italy would remove an initial 300 soldiers from its 3,000-strong contingent beginning in September, but he stressed a full pullout would depend on security conditions and consultation with the U.S.-led coalition and Iraqi officials.

JAPAN: The apparent kidnapping of a Japanese man by a militant group in Iraq won't affect Tokyo's troop deployment there, Japan's defense chief said Tuesday, and the captive's family urged the government to stay the course. The Ansar al-Sunnah Army claimed on its Web site that it had kidnapped Akihiko Saito, 44.

[Last modified May 11, 2005, 00:47:09]