Insurgent attacks kill 22
BAGHDAD, Iraq – A car bomb exploded outside a police academy in northern Iraq today, and when police set up a checkpoint to close off the area, a second car bomb exploded nearby, authorities said. At least six Iraqis were killed and 25 wounded, a hospital official said.
The coordinated attack in Tikrit, the hometown of Saddam Hussein, occurred just as new police recruits were about to leave the academy and travel to Amman, Jordan, for a training program, said police Lt. Shalan Allawi. Tikrit is 80 miles north of Baghdad.
At Tikrit General Hospital, Dr. Mohammed Ayash said four policemen and two civilians were killed by the bombs, and 23 policemen and two civilians wounded.
South of the capital, three insurgents were killed today as the roadside bomb they were trying to plant in the town of Mahawil exploded, police said in the nearby city of Hillah.
The explosions were the latest in a series of stepped up attacks by insurgents. On Saturday, at least 16 people were killed, including an American soldier, as the insurgents struck across the country with a series of bomb attacks.
U.S. forces captured six men suspected in the downing of a civilian helicopter and the shooting death of the lone survivor.
The suspects in the helicopter downing were caught after U.S. soldiers from Task Force Baghdad were tipped off by an Iraqi civilian who told the Americans that he knew where insurgents had stashed a blue Kia pickup truck that was used in the attack and led them to the site, the military said in a statement.
Soldiers searched two nearby houses shortly after midnight Saturday, arresting three men and seizing bomb-making material in the first home. Three suspects were grabbed from the second residence and all were being questioned, the military said.
U.S. forces did not identify the captives or say where they were taken into custody.
The Russian-made Mi-8 helicopter, flying from Baghdad to Tikrit, was shot down about 12 miles north of the capital on Thursday. The dead included six American bodyguards for U.S. diplomats, three Bulgarian crew members and two security guards from Fiji.
Two groups claimed responsibility for the attack and released video to support their claims.
In one video, insurgents are seen capturing and shooting to death the lone survivor, identified as a Bulgarian pilot.
The aircraft was owned by Heli Air of Bulgaria and chartered by Toronto-based SkyLink Aviation Inc. The six Americans were employed by Blackwater Security Consulting – a subsidiary of security contractor Blackwater USA of Moyock, N.C. Four of its employees were slain and mutilated by insurgents in Fallujah a year ago.
In other violence, Associated Press Television News cameraman Saleh Ibrahim was shot and killed when gunfire broke out after an explosion in the northern city of Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad.
AP photographer Mohammed Ibrahim, no relation to the dead man, suffered shrapnel wounds in the same incident.
While at the hospital, Mohammed Ibrahim was escorted away by U.S. forces along with his brother and their whereabouts could not immediately be determined. The U.S. military said it was investigating the incident.