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80 militants killed in US raid in Iraq
(Agencies)
Updated: 2005-03-23 22:47
U.S. and Iraqi forces raided a suspected guerrilla training camp and killed
80 fighters, the single biggest one-day death toll for militants in months and
the latest in a series of blows to the insurgency, Iraqi officials said
Wednesday.
Politicians helping shape a postelection government expected within days said
negotiators are considering a Sunni Arab as defense minister in a move aimed at
bringing them into the political process — and perhaps deflate the insurgency
they lead.
The U.S. military announced late Tuesday that its
air and ground forces backed Iraqi commandos during a noontime raid on
the suspected training camp near Lake Tharthar in central Iraq. Seven commandos died in
fighting, the U.S. military said. It did not give a death toll for the
militants.
Iraqi officials said Wednesday 80 insurgents died in the clash — the
largest number killed in a single battle since the U.S. Marine-led November
attack on the former militant stronghold of Fallujah left more than 1,000 dead.
On Sunday, U.S. forces killed 26 attackers after an ambush south of Baghdad.
Also Wednesday, a mortar shell or rocket struck an elementary school in
western Baghdad, killing at least one child and injuring three others, according
to a police official who asked not to be identified out of fear of retribution
by attackers.
Children fled the schoolhouse, abandoning backpacks and books on desks
littered with glass shards. One teacher wept outside as parents rushed to the
scene.
Hours later, a policeman trying to defuse a roadside bomb in Baghdad died
and another officer was wounded when the device exploded, police Capt. Talib
Thamir said.
On the political front, Abbas Hassan Mousa al-Bayati, a top member of the
United Iraqi Alliance, said negotiators from his Shiite-dominated bloc and a
Kurdish coalition could tap a Sunni Arab to head the ministry of defense, which
oversees the Iraqi army battling the insurgency.
"The Defense Ministry will go to a Sunni Arab because we do not want Arab
Sunnis to feel that they are marginalized," al-Bayati told The Associated Press.
"They will be given one of the four major posts because we want them to feel
that they are part of the political formula."
Sunni Arabs, dominant under ousted dictator Saddam
Hussein, largely stayed away from the Jan. 30 balloting amid calls for them to
boycott and threats against voters by the Sunni-led insurgency.
Political leaders have in the past announced plans on filling Cabinet
positions, only to reverse themselves later.
Al-Bayati said his group and the Kurdish coalition, which together won
215 seats in the new 275-seat National Assembly, were expected to name a
president Saturday, the next step toward forming a new government. Kurdish
leader Jalal Talabani is expected to fill the post.
Fuad Masoum, a member of the Kurdish negotiating team, said no definitive
decisions on the 32-member Cabinet have been made. He declined to confirm that a
Sunni Arab will be named defense minister but said that was one option under
consideration.
Handing the post to a Sunni Arab could help undermine support for the
insurgency, while assuaging Sunni fears that the Shiites will dominate all
aspect's of the country's upcoming government.
The army chief of staff could be a Shiite, al-Bayati said.
He added that his bloc was pressing for a Shiite to head the Interior
Ministry, which oversees the police — Iraq's other main security force — and
that a Kurd could become foreign minister.
Amid the political wrangling, top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali
al-Sistani had been scheduled to talk with Talabani on Wednesday. But the
meeting was canceled due to "security concerns," said Meithemn Faisal, an
official from al-Sistani's office.
Kurds are thought to number between 15 percent and 20
percent of Iraq's 25 million people, with Sunni Arabs roughly equivalent. Shiite
Arabs make up 60 percent of the population.
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