Militants and police among the 14 killed in Iraq clashes (Roundup)

Sep 23, 2007, 14:34 GMT

Baghdad - Fourteen Iraqis, including militants and a police officer, were killed during separate operations and raids by US army and Iraqi police, local authorities and new reports said Sunday.

In one incident on Sunday, at least four people were killed and five wounded in separate incidents around the country, police said.

Clashes between gunmen and police in the district of Jabla in the city of Hilla, 100 kilometres south of the capital Baghdad, left at least three gunmen and a policeman dead.

Mortar shells and light weapons were used in the fierce fighting that broke out in the early morning, police sources told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

In another incident, 10 militants were killed while 22 suspected terrorists were detained during operations targeting al-Qaeda network across central Iraq, the US military said.

Separately, five people - three of them Iraqi army personnel - were injured when a suicide bomber blew the minibus he was driving up near an army checkpoint in the city of Baquba, 60 kilometres northeast of Baghdad, police said.

In another development, Iraqi security forces detained eight terror suspects in two separate raids. Four of the suspects were linked a weapons trafficker dealing with Iran, the US military said.

Iraqi special forces detained four terror suspects linked to a financier and weapons trafficker in the province of Diyala, east of Baghdad, according to the US military said in a statement.

'Intelligence reports that the regional financier facilitates weapons purchases with Iran in order to conduct trafficking operations that import improvised explosive devices, explosively formed penetrators and rocket-propelled grenades,' the statement said.

In a separate raid by the 4th Iraqi army division, four suspects were detained in Tikrit, 180 kilometres north of Baghdad. Two of the suspects are believed to be behind many attacks on coalition forces.

'The raid is also believed to have disrupted a possible forgery operation where food credits from the social welfare system were being criminally filtered to insurgents,' according to the statement.

US special forces advised Iraqi troops during the raids.

Meanwhile, a US soldier was reported killed and another wounded a day earlier their patrol was hit by a blast in Baghdad.

More than 55 US soldiers were killed in Iraq in September, according to a report by the independent Voices of Iraq news agency.

The highest toll recorded was in November 2004, when 127 US soldiers died in combat. Many lost their lives during clashes with militants in the northern Anbar province.

Around 4,000 US soldiers have been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion was launched in 2003, VOI said.