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Violence obscures Iraq's gains

Major losses compete with claims that a security push in Baghdad is working.

By ASSOCIATED PRESS
Published August 30, 2006

BAGHDAD - Despite promising signs that a U.S. crackdown is curbing sectarian killings in Baghdad, violence surged Tuesday, with more than two dozen bodies found across the capital. The government also revised a death toll from fighting the day before to 73.

The U.S. military also said three American soldiers and one Marine were killed the day before - two in combat in Anbar province and two from nonhostile causes. A fourth soldier died on Tuesday in Baghdad. At least 13 American service members have died in Iraq since Sunday, according to the U.S. command.

Elsewhere, an oil pipeline exploded in southern Iraq, sparking a huge fire and killing at least 36 people and injuring 45, the Interior Ministry said.

The reason for the explosion was not clear, but police Lt. Raid Jabir said several people had been siphoning fuel from the pipeline when the blast occurred. Iraqis have faced severe fuel shortages, and insurgents also have frequently targeted pipelines and oil refineries.

The pipeline was 6 miles south of Diwaniyah, the scene of fierce clashes Monday between the Iraqi army and Shiite militiamen loyal to the radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Local officials had reported only 40 fatalities Monday, but on Tuesday, Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's office announced 73 were killed, including 50 militiamen and 23 Iraqi soldiers. There was no immediate explanation for the discrepancy.

Tribal leaders held reconciliation talks Tuesday to prevent retaliatory attacks and "life is back to normal," said Jabir, the local police lieutenant. He said the militia had withdrawn from all the areas it had seized.

The Diwaniyah fighting illustrates the complexity of the security crisis in Iraq, with Sunni insurgents fighting U.S. troops in the west, Sunnis and Shiites killing one another in Baghdad, and now Shiites battling Shiites in the south.

During a one-day visit to Baghdad, U.S. Attorney General Alberto Gonzales said that Iraq's future would depend on its enforcing the rule of law but that only its people and political leaders could decide what type of law that would be.

The latest violence occurred despite U.S. and Iraqi officials' claims that a new security operation in the capital has lowered Sunni-Shiite killings there, which had risen in June and July.

On Monday, a U.S. military spokesman, Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell, said the murder rate in Baghdad had fallen by 46 percent from July to August.

That figure could not be independently confirmed. But an employee of the main Baghdad city morgue, Muyaid Matrood, said that as of Monday, his office had received 337 bodies of people who had died violently this month, excluding bombing victims.

Health Ministry officials said about 1,500 violent deaths were reported in June as well as in July, including bombing victims. Even so, Deputy Health Minister Sabah al-Husseini said the previous surge in deaths had "obviously" diminished.

In Baghdad on Tuesday, 27 bodies were found in three locations and seven people were killed in three mortar attacks, police said. Four beheaded corpses were recovered from the Tigris River about 25 miles south of Baghdad, local officials reported.

[Last modified August 30, 2006, 01:10:03]