Bomber targets Iraqi general

Source: Agencies  |   2008-6-5  |     NEWSPAPER EDITION

A SUICIDE truck bomber struck near the Baghdad home of an Iraqi police general yesterday, killing 16 people in the biggest such attack on the capital in months.

Meanwhile, three United States soldiers were shot dead in northern Iraq, and the decaying bodies of at least 23 Iraqis were discovered in a shallow grave and a sewer shaft at separate sites near Baghdad. The suicide bombing was the deadliest such attack in Baghdad since early March. A year ago, car and truck bombs were part of the daily din of violence in Baghdad, with hundreds sometimes killed in a single, devastating blast, but they have occurred far less frequently since a US troop buildup.

The Iraqi general was not injured, but at least 16 others died including a child, and about 50 people were hurt, according to Iraqi police and hospital officials.

The Americans were killed when gunmen opened fire on them in the northern Iraqi village of Hawija.

The area, once a hub for Sunni militants and disaffected allies of Saddam Hussein, is thought to have been pacified in recent months. Last year it hosted one of the largest sign-on ceremonies for tribal sheiks partnering with US forces to fight al-Qaida in Iraq.

The latest US deaths bring to at least 4,090 the number of US military personnel who have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003.

South of Baghdad, Iraqi villagers and soldiers unearthed at least 13 bodies from a shallow, dusty grave in farmland on the outskirts of Latifiyah, a mostly Sunni town that also has some Shiite residents.

Associated Press Television News footage showed at least three severely decomposed bodies in side-by-side graves.

The US military could not confirm the discovery, but said its soldiers found at least 10 decomposed bodies on Tuesday in a separate location, in the sewer shaft of a building in east Baghdad.