Allawi Warns Fallujah Rebels of Deadline
2 hours, 19 minutes ago Middle East - AP
By TINI TRAN, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD, Iraq - Insurgents killed two American Marines and wounded four others in fighting west of Baghdad, the U.S. military said Friday, as Iraq (news - web sites)'s prime minister warned that the "window is closing" for a peaceful settlement to avert a mass assault on the insurgent-held city of Fallujah.
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In preparation for an offensive, U.S. jets launched multiple airstrikes early Friday against insurgent positions in Fallujah, while U.S. soldiers sealed off roads into Fallujah overnight. The Iraqis also closed off a crossing point from Syria, Syrian officials said.
The two Marines were killed Thursday in Anbar province, which includes Fallujah, but the Marines refused to say where and how they died. In addition, a U.S. soldier was killed and another wounded when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle Thursday north of Baghdad.
Three British soldiers were killed Thursday south of Baghdad and eight others were wounded when a suicide driver blew up his vehicle at a checkpoint. An Iraqi translator also died in the attack.
It was the single biggest loss of life for the British since August 2003 and came only days after British troops redeployed from the relative safety of the south to the base close to Baghdad in order to free up U.S. troops for a Fallujah offensive.
Iraq's interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi suggested Friday that the offensive could come soon. U.S. and Iraqi commanders want to clear insurgents from Fallujah and other Sunni Muslim areas north and west of Baghdad so national elections can be held by the end of January.
"We intend to liberate the people and to bring the rule of law to Fallujah," Allawi told reporters in Brussels after meeting with European Union (news - web sites) leaders. "The window really is closing for a peaceful settlement."
Allawi spoke in English. An Arabic-language TV channel, al-Arabiya, quoted him as saying "the window had closed," apparently a mistranslation.
"We have been asked by the people of Fallujah to help them liberate them from the terrorists and insurgents," he said. Allawi said most to the city's civilian population had left.
The U.S. airstrikes early Friday hit a system of barriers rigged with bombs in the southeastern part of the city, a command post, suspected fighting positions and a weapons cache, said Lt. Nathan Braden, of 1st Marine Division.
Explosions could be heard in the southern part of Fallujah Friday afternoon.
Also Friday, U.S. Marines fired on a civilian vehicle that did not stop at a checkpoint in Fallujah, killing an Iraqi woman and wounding her husband, according to the U.S. military and witnesses. The car didn't notice the checkpoint at the time, witnesses said.
"Marines fire upon vehicles only as a last resort when verbal and visual warnings to stop fail. Such was the case today," the Marines said in an e-mailed response.
Meanwhile, the head of the Iraqi election commission said national balloting will be held in the last week of January but no precise date has been set, denying media reports that they were set for Jan. 27.
The commission also has said that Iraqis who live outside the country will be allowed to vote. Commission spokesman Fareed Ayar said the government planned to establish voting centers in countries with large Iraqi populations. Details of how many centers, where they would be located and which countries would be involved have not been finalized, he said.
American officials plan to use a mixed American and Iraqi force to storm Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, if interim Prime Minister Ayad Allawi gives the go-ahead.
Iraqi authorities have put together a team of Iraqi administrators to run Fallujah after the fighting, Marine Maj. Jim West said Thursday. West said $75 million has been earmarked to repair the city.
The strategy is similar to one used when U.S. troops restored government authority in the Shiite holy city Najaf last August after weeks of fighting with militiamen.
The three Britons slain Thursday were part of the Black Watch regiment, a Scottish unit shifted to central Iraq. British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) had agreed to a U.S. request to move British troops to central Iraq despite considerable opposition at home, even within his Labour Party.
The deteriorating security situation prompted the humanitarian organization Medecins Sans Frontieres, or Doctors Without Borders (news - web sites), to announce it was closing its operations in Iraq. CARE International withdrew from the country after its national director, Margaret Hassan, was kidnapped last month.
An Iraqi known for cooperating with Americans was killed near Ramadi, police said. The assailants stopped a car carrying Sheik Bezei Ftaykhan, ordered the driver to leave and pumped about 30 bullets into the sheik's body, police said.
The wave of violence in Iraq has also been marked by the kidnapping of more than 170 foreigners, more than 30 of them killed, since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites)'s regime fell in April 2003.
On Friday, Nepal's Foreign Minister confirmed a Nepalese man abducted by gunmen Monday along with an American, a Filipino, and three Iraqis had been freed by his captors in Baghdad. Two Iraqi guards were released earlier in the week.
The American, whose identity has not been released, and Filipino accountant Robert Tarongoy, 31, are still missing. Both worked for the Saudi Arabian Trading and Construction Co., based in Riyadh.
A Lebanese American contractor was also seized in Baghdad earlier this week. His captors have also not identified themselves.
However, two Lebanese hostages held for more than a month were freed after a ransom was paid, one of the former hostages said Friday. Marwan Ibrahim Kassar and Mohammed Jawdat Hussein were released unharmed Wednesday and returned to Lebanon.
In other developments Friday:
_ Four buses carrying Shiite pilgrims to Karbala plunged into a river near Latifiyah in central Iraq, killing 18 people on board, when the drivers apparently failed to see that a bridge had been destroyed two days earlier by insurgents, said Dr. Dawoud al-Taie of nearby Mahmoudiya Hospital.
_ A private security company, Global Risk Strategies, said a British contractor was killed in a suicide car bombing at Baghdad airport Wednesday that also injured several Iraqi civilians.
_ In Muqdadiyah, north of Baghdad, a mortar shell targeting a police station fell short, killing two children in a nearby home, police said.
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