In the aftermath of the momentous capture of Saddam Hussein, car bombings, shootings and death have remained a daily diet mixed with a new twist of street violence from angry supporters of the ousted president.
In the loyalist strongholds of Tikrit, Samarra, Fallujah and Ramadi as well as Baghdad, old regime die-hards have attacked US forces and their Iraqi allies.
And US troops have hit back hard, killing at least 17 people in the last 24 hours.
Barely had news sunk in of the dictator’s humiliating surrender down a ”rat-hole” than two car bombs killed eight people and wounded 17 at two other police stations around Baghdad on Monday morning.
In Samarra, 125km northwest of the capital, later the same day, US Task Force Iron Horse soldiers said they shot dead 11 attackers who tried to ambush them in a series of firefights.
A military statement said a patrol had ”repelled a complex ambush” in Samarra on Monday afternoon, emerging unscathed despite being ”inundated” with fire, including automatic weapons, an improvised explosive device, rocket-propelled grenades and mortar fire.
”A company commander on the scene confirmed that 11 attackers had been killed. After confirmation, Samarran residents moved the attackers’ bodies from the area.”
”There were no Coalition casualties during the firefight and, except for a civilian automobile that was damaged by a rocket-propelled grenade, there was no damage to any other property or equipment,” it said.
Clashes between insurgents and US troops in Samarra on November 30 left 54 attackers dead and 22 wounded, according to the US military, but the story was disputed and the town’s hospital insisted it had only eight bodies.
Meanwhile, three US soldiers were wounded by a bomb on Tuesday in Tikrit, Saddam’s hometown.
Reporters saw the soldiers, one with head wounds, evacuated by helicopter to a nearby hospital for the 4th Infantry Division after their Humvee vehicle hit a so-called improvised explosive device.
”They will be okay, hopefully they’ll be back soon,” said a soldier.
Also Tuesday, police fired in the air to disperse a pro-Saddam protest by 250 women students in the tense city, a correspondent
said.
The day before, police had used batons on several hundred students who turned out after the ousted dictator Saddam was captured south of Tikrit on Saturday night. It was the same story in the northern capital of Mosul, where police fired in the air Tuesday to disperse some 1 000 students who demonstrated inside the university to condemn the ”humiliating” capture of Saddam, another correspondent said.
Riots had erupted Monday night in the mainly Sunni Muslim towns of Ramadi and Fallujah, where posters of Saddam were put up and government offices ransacked. The US military said on Tuesday one soldier had been injured in Ramadi, 100km west of Baghdad, after pro-Saddam demonstrations by between 500 and 750 people.
”US forces were fired upon, wounding one US soldier,” when a platoon moved to the governor’s offices, a spokesperson said.
”US forces returned fire killing two and wounding two.”
”In a separate attack, approximately 30 Iraqis began firing on a unit returning from a weapons cache,” a military statement said.
”The unit returned fire, killing one of the attackers.”
The latest trouble in Ramadi was mirrored in Fallujah, where two Iraqis were also gunned down, police and journalists at the scene said. The fatal shootings came in the resistance stronghold, 60km west of Baghdad, after pro-Saddam demonstrators also sacked the regional government offices there, forcing police to flee.
US troops took control of the sacked government offices and stationed themselves around the local police station, which officers had deserted in the afternoon. Military aircraft dropped flares and US soldiers used loudhailers to call on residents to give up their arms. They threatened to ”shoot anyone seen with a gun in his hand.”
The US troops deployed after Saddam supporters sacked the government building and set all the wreckage alight in a huge bonfire outside, correspondents said.
Two large pictures of Saddam and Iraqi flags were hung from the top of the building.
Fallujah broke out in joyous displays earlier on Monday after rumours spread that the man US forces captured Saturday night was not the former Iraqi leader.
US Central Command said late Monday that in the past 24 hours US forces in al-Anbar province, west of Baghdad, killed four ”enemy personnel” and captured 16 in the course of ”security operations” while suffering one US death.
No details were give about the US death and it was not clear if any of the deaths overlapped.
Central Command said two ”enemy” personnel died in an exchange of fire with a patrol of US paratroops.
”In addition, a reconnaissance (team) engaged four armed enemy personnel northeast of Fallujah with small arms fire, killing one,” the statement said.
Near Ramadi, a US patrol was ambushed with RPGs and small arms fire.
One insurgent died when the US unit returned fire, Central Command said.
In Baghdad, a loyalist demonstration degenerated into gunfire and attacks on two police stations by abut 100 assailants in the Sunni Muslim quarter of Adhamiyeh in the northern part of the city on Monday afternoon.
But, more than 200 Shiites and victims of Saddam Hussein’s regime also marched in central Baghdad on Tuesday.
”Death for Saddam. Death for Baathists,” said one of their banners, referring to Saddam’s ruling party.
”We call for a public and fast trial for Saddam and his criminal followers,” said another banner signed by a group calling itself the family of martyrs. – Sapa-AFP