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Saturday, Feb. 12, 2005

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  Elsewhere, a prominent Iraqi judge under Saddam Hussein, Taha al-Amiri, was assassinated Saturday by two gunmen in the southern port city of Basra, said Lt. Col. Karim al-Zaidi.

Al-Amiri, a former chief judge at Basra's highest criminal court, is one of several former Baath Party figures assassinated in the Basra area the past 18 months. Suspicion has fallen on Shiite extremists seeking revenge for Saddam's oppression of the majority Shiite community.

Police in Mosul said they discovered the bodies of six men dressed in Iraqi National Guard uniforms dumped on a main highway near the city. The bodies of six Kurds who had apparently worked for as security guards were also found in Mosul, a hospital official said.

The six Iraqi National Guardsmen had been shot in the chest and head, said police Lt. Ali Hussein. They were found in the area of Intisar, east of Mosul.

Attacks against Iraq's security forces have steadily risen following the Jan. 30 national elections. Insurgents have vowed to intensify their attacks against the Iraqi forces at a time when the United States is trying to give those forces more security responsibility.

But the body count of police seems to be particularly high in Mosul, the country's third-largest city, which has now become another flashpoint in the running battle between insurgents and U.S. and coalition troops.

Last week, a suicide bomber walked into a crowd of Iraqi policeman in Mosul, killing himself and 12 policemen. In December more than 150 bodies of mainly Iraqi security forces were found in Mosul in the space of one month.

In Fallujah, a former insurgent stronghold that fell in a U.S. military siege in November, several hundred traffic police returned to the streets Saturday for the first time since the assault.

The return of about 500 traffic policemen seemed to be a first tentative step at redeploying the city's Iraqi security forces.

Dumped on Highway

South of Baghdad, gunmen shot dead a Sunni imam who worked for an endowment that handles funds for mosques. The man's son was also killed in the shooting. Their bodies were found dumped on a highway Thursday, officials said. It wasn't clear if the attack was a reprisal killing by Shiites seeking revenge for insurgent attacks on their community.

Friday's violence underscored some of the violence inflicted on Shiites by Sunni Arab extremists, who form the core of Iraq's insurgency.

On Friday, a vegetable truck rigged with explosives blew up outside a Shiite mosque northeast of Baghdad, and gunmen sprayed automatic fire into a bakery in a Shiite district of the capital in sectarian violence that killed at least 23.

The attacks occurred as election officials announced provisional final results from the Jan. 30 elections for provincial councils in 12 of the 18 provinces, showing Shiite religious groups winning over secular tickets in local races in much of the country.

Final results from the more closely watched national race for the 275-member National Assembly are expected in a few days. A Shiite-dominated ticket endorsed by the clergy is also leading in the national contest, indicating the growing influence of religion in the politics of the new Iraq.

In other violence:

- A suicide driver rammed a U.S. Bradley Fighting Vehicle and exploded in Salaheddin province north of Baghdad, injuring three soldiers, the military said.

- Two Iraqi civilians were killed during a clash between U.S. troops and insurgents in Mosul.

- U.S. Marines killed two insurgents during an attack Friday night on a Marine position near Husaybah along the Syrian border, the military said.

Overall, at least 31 people were killed Friday, including 23 in the two sectarian attacks.

Friday's bombing outside the Shiite mosque took place in Balad Ruz, 45 miles northeast of Baghdad. A pickup truck loaded with vegetables exploded just as worshippers were leaving prayer services. At least 12 people were killed, according to police Col. Tahseen Mohammed.

In the attack on the bakery in eastern Baghdad, gunmen shot and killed 11 people, police said. The assailants escaped.

The attack appeared to fit a pattern of brutality by Sunni extremists against Shiites as the majority community stands on the verge of taking power as a result of the elections.

© 2005 Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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