Eleven killed in Iraq, another mass grave found (Roundup)

Apr 27, 2008, 14:15 GMT

Baghdad - Iraqi troops uncovered Sunday a mass grave containing 50 bodies in Iraq's restive Diyala province while at least 11 people were killed and 31 wounded in attacks across the country, security officials said.

Iraqi army troops helped by tribal police units discovered the mass grave on a farm in Kiba village in Baquba, 57 kilometres north- east of Baghdad, an unnamed security official told the Voices of Iraq news agency.

The Al-Qaeda in Iraq terrorist group controlled Kiba and other nearby villages, which saw a wave of killings and kidnappings before the enforcement of a security crackdown in the province in June, the official said.

It is likely that the bodies were of people executed by al-Qaeda though there is no evidence for this, the official said.

Meanwhile in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, two car bombs went off, killing six people and injuring 10, according to the state-owned Al-Iraqiyah news broadcaster.

Earlier, two civilians were injured in an attack by gunmen on a checkpoint in the village of Qasr, south-east of Mosul.

A spate of coordinated bomb attacks in Mosul, 400 kilometres north of Baghdad, on Saturday left at least seven people dead and over 20 injured.

Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, has recently been centre stage for Sunni insurgent activities, which led the government to send military reinforcements to the city in preparation for a major offensive.

Also in the north, an Iraqi soldier was shot dead by gunmen while on his way to his unit in the town of Tuz Khurmatu, south of the oil- rich city of Kirkuk, according to police.

To the west of Kirkuk, the Iraqi military arrested a leader of the Sunni extremist Islamic State of Iraq group.

'Acting on intelligence, troops launched security sweeps at eight o'clock Sunday morning in Srabi village in the Riyadh area and arrested the terrorist Ali Shukr Salih, also known as Sayyid Ali,' Brigadier-General Taki Mahmud said.

Salih is suspected of carrying out kidnappings and killings in the area.

In Baghdad, four people were killed, including a policeman and a soldier, and 19 wounded in twin bombings, according to security officials.

In the first blast, an Iraqi army checkpoint was struck by a car bomb in the Mansur district of west Baghdad, killing a soldier and injuring six people.

The other blast occurred when a car bomb hit a police patrol near central Baghdad's al-Shaab stadium, killing a policeman and injuring 13 people, the officials said.

The US military said five 'criminals' were killed in three separate airstrikes by US drones on separate air-to-ground engagements in Baghdad's Sadr City district in east Baghdad overnight and on Sunday.

The US military refers to militiamen from the Mahdi Army of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr as criminals. Iraqi and US troops have been engaged in deadly clashes with the Mahdi Army in the slum area of Sadr City since the end of March.

Seeking to end the fighting in the Shiite enclave, Iraq's President Jalal Talabani and the speaker of parliament Mahmud al- Mashhadani met Sunday and discussed ways of ending the crisis.

Al-Mashhadani confirmed reports that lawmakers from the Sadr Bloc in parliament would meet members of the government's executive council to end the fighting in Sadr City.

'Talabani welcomes this move. The present era is one of dialogue and political and diplomatic solutions to divisive issues,' according to a statement from the president's office.