War News for Friday, March 26, 2010

Judge to rule on case involving 24 Iraqi deaths:

Xe sells aviation division to beef up balance sheet:


Reported security incidents

Baghdad:
#1: A Sahwa leader was killed on Thursday and two more were wounded in a bomb explosion in western Baghdad, a police source said. “An improvised explosive device went off in al-Ray neighborhood in western Baghdad, killing Ahmad Mahmoud Abd Uhud, a Sahwa (Awakening) leader, and seriously wounding two of his companions, who were rushed to a nearby hospital for treatment.

#2: One woman and her daughter were killed in an armed attack in southeastern Baghdad, a police source said on Thursday. “Three gunmen stormed a house in Jisr Diala region in southeastern Baghdad, killing a woman and her daughter and fled to unknown place.


Tuz Khormato:
#1: A civilian man was killed and four others wounded when an improvised explosive device (IED) went off near a motorcade of the police chief of Touz Khormato district on Thursday evening, a local security source said. “An IED planted by unidentified gunmen in central Touz Khormato, (80 km) south of Kirkuk province, went off near the motorcade of the district police chief, killing one civilian and wounding four others,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency. “The motorcade was intact,” he said, adding the wounded were rushed to a nearby hospital for treatment.


Kirkuk:
#1: Unidentified gunmen kidnapped a medical doctor in front of his house in central Kirkuk on Thursday, according to a senior security official in the city. “Gunmen boarding a vehicle with an unidentified number plate kidnapped Dr. Hashim Mohammed Amin on the Baghdad Road, central Kirkuk,” Brig. Sarhad Qader, the director of the Kirkuk Districts’ Police Department (KDPD), told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.

#2: A civilian man was wounded by unidentified gunmen fire in Kirkuk on Thursday, a local security source said. “Unidentified gunmen in a vehicle opened fire on a local resident in area between al-Qadissiya and al-Nasr neighborhoods, leaving him sustaining several wounds in the chest,” the source, who is from the Kirkuk-based Joint Coordination Center (JCC), told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.


Mosul:
#1: A policeman and a child were wounded in an improvised explosive device (IED) blast in central Mosul city on Thursday, a local police source in Ninewa said. “The IED attack targeted a police patrol in the area of al-Mikkawi, central Mosul, leaving a policeman and a child who happened to be near the blast scene wounded,” the source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency.



Afghanistan: "The Forgotten War"
#1: Five Pakistani soldiers and at least 21 suspected militants were killed in clashes in a region near the Afghan border where the military is pursuing Taliban insurgents fleeing a U.S.-backed offensive, authorities said Friday. Local government official Sami Ullah said the fighting occurred after dawn Friday when militants attacked a checkpoint. He said at least 27 militants died. But an army statement said 21 insurgents were killed, and the clashes occurred when security forces were trying to recapture a checkpoint taken Thursday night by militants in the Kalaya area of Orakzai.

#2: The reports came a day after officials said 61 suspected militants died in airstrikes in the same region, Orakzai, and underscored the challenge facing Pakistan as it tries to wipe out Pakistani Taliban fighters bent on overthrowing the state. On Thursday, jet fire rained down in the Mamuzai area of Orakzai, targeting a religious seminary, a mosque and a school, local official Samiullah Orakzai said. The center was targeted because a group of Taliban leaders were believed to be meeting there in the afternoon, the officials said. Some four dozen people died in the airstrikes in and around the seminary, while 13 others were killed in morning strikes at the two other sites. The officials said all 61 killed were suspected militants.

#3: A provincial police chief said six Taliban fighters and two construction workers were killed in an air strike by foreign troops southeastern Paktika province. However, the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) said no air strike had taken place there. Provincial police chief Dawlat Khan Zadran said the air strike was summoned after the Taliban ambushed a joint convoy of Afghan and foreign forces. One police officer was wounded, but there were no casualties among foreign forces from the Taliban ambush, he said. An ISAF spokesman said a "minor clash" had taken place, but aircraft did not fire and there were no reports of casualties.

#4: Two Afghan children were killed and four members of their family were wounded by shrapnel after an exchange of fire between militants and foreign forces in Khost province, near the border with Pakistan, the NATO-led force said. The international force said in a statement that it was treating the wounded and investigating which side was responsible for the shooting that caused the civilian casualties.

#5: The Afghan army killed six insurgents in an operation in Marjah district of southern Helmand province on Wednesday, the Afghan Ministry of Defence said.