At least 6 killed in attacks across Iraq (Roundup)

Jul 20, 2009, 13:52 GMT

Baghdad - A young girl was among at least six people killed across Iraq on Monday, police said, in a series of attacks that have raised concerns that insurgents in the country may be regrouping.

Police in the northern city of Mosul told the German Press Agency dpa that 'unknown gunmen' shot the girl near her home in the eastern Mosul district of Palestine.

They would not elaborate except to say that the attackers then ran away, and that they were investigating the incident.

In a separate incident, in the Mosul district of al-Thaqafiya, one policeman was killed and a second wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near their patrol.

In two other attacks in the city, gunmen shot and killed a traffic police officer on duty in a northern district of Mosul, and fatally shot a second as he was on his way to work in the New Mosul district.

The attacks followed a pre-dawn raid on suspected militants that resulted in the arrest of six people suspected of taking part in attacks on police and civilians in al-Quds neighborhood of eastern Mosul, police said.

Mosul and its environs, one of the most ethnically and religiously diverse areas in Iraq, remain the site of near-daily, deadly attacks despite successive security sweeps that police say have netted hundreds of insurgents this year.

Political tensions have recently escalated as the new, Arab- nationalist provincial government elected in January has vowed to rid the province of the Kurdish Pershmerga militias that have policed predominantly Kurdish areas of the province.

Those vows came as the Kurdish Regional Government in the neighbouring semi-autonomous Kurdish region passed a draft constitution including parts of the province in its definition of Kurdistan.

Meanwhile, in Iraq's Sunni heartland to the west of Baghdad, a series of bombings has raised fears that insurgents in the area may be regrouping.

Police General Tariq al-Assil, head of police in western al-Anbar Province, said two of his men had been killed, and at least four wounded, as they attempted to defuse a car bomb in the city of Ramadi, some 118 kilometres to the west of the capital.

The attack took place on the road leading to the seat of al- Anbar's provincial government around the time the city's mayor, Qassim Mohammed, normally goes to work, police told the dpa earlier that morning.

On Sunday, a US marine was killed in the area in a 'combat-related incident as a result of enemy action, a statement by the military said.

The area west of Baghdad was the site of some of the worst fighting between insurgents and Iraqi and US forces until the government-recruited Sahwa, or 'Awakening,' militias to maintain security in the region.

But Sahwa members have increasingly come under attack in recent days.

Mahmoud al-Jabalawi, the leader of the local Sahwa militia for the district of al-Mada'in, 15 kilometres south of Baghdad, was killed by a roadside bomb on Sunday.

'The Sahwa (militias) are caught between the hammer and the anvil, targeted by terrorist groups,' Amr al-Hijal, a Sunni member of parliament, said after al-Jabalawi's death.

Al-Jabalawi's murder followed an assassination attempt against Sheikh Naim Salih al-Halubsi, the leader of the local Sahwa in Karama, near Faluja.

Three of al-Halubsi's bodyguards, including his son, were killed in the attack, police said.

Earlier Sunday, an Iraqi soldier was killed and six people were wounded in two bomb attacks in Abu Ghraib, just west of the Iraqi capital, police said.