More arrests with crackdown in south, blasts in the north (Roundup)

Jun 20, 2008, 20:01 GMT

Baghdad - Six wanted men were arrested and weapons were seized on Friday during security operations in central Amara city, the official spokesman for the Iraqi Defense Ministry said.

Moreover, Iraqi troops arrested 3 gangs specialized in kidnapping and killing on Friday, a source was quoted by the Voices of Iraq (VOI) news agency.

One of the gangs consisted of 20 policemen, the source added without giving more details about the other two gangs.

In the early hours on Thursday, troops started a security offensive against militias in Amara city, capital of Missan, after a four-day deadline by Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki for militants to surrender their arms expired.

Amara, 390 kilometres south of Baghdad, is in a rural marshland on the Iranian border where Iraqi officials say weapons smuggling from Iran and the militias' uncontrolled activity have created lawlessness.

Sadrist lawmaker Ahmed al-Massoudi said on Friday that security operation in Missan turned from a military operation into a political process against the Sadrists, calling to free the Missan deputy governor and the provincial council's two members who were arrested by Iraqi security forces.

General Abdul Karem Khalaf announced at a press conference in Baghdad that five of those arrested since the beginning of the operation gave themselves up to the security authorities.

'The second day of the operation witnessed wide-scale security operations and passed without problems thanks to citizens' cooperation,' he continued.

In the Nineveh province, 11 policemen were wounded when an explosive device targeted their patrol.

Earlier on Friday, a source in Nineveh police told VOI that five policemen were injured in another blast in Nineveh's capital Mosul, 405 km north of Baghdad.

Also in the north, an Iraqi soldier was killed and three more, including a police officer, were injured when an bomb targeted their patrol in the northern city of Baquba, capital of the restive Diyala province.

US military said one soldier was killed and five wounded when three explosive devices targeted their patrol in Diyala province, some 60 km north of the capital.

The death brings the number of US soldiers killed in Iraq since the US-invasion of Iraq in March 2003 to 4,102. Of this number, 18 soldiers have been so far killed in June.