Soldier shot as attacks on allies escalate

ATTACKS on Allied forces in Iraq continued yesterday and, with shattered glass, blood stains and mangled vehicles littering the landscape, there is growing concern that the occupation could be turning into a fully fledged guerrilla war.

A US soldier was shot in the head while buying digital video discs at a shop in Baghdad yesterday, the shop owner and other witnesses said.

The US military had no immediate comment on the report, which adds to the growing list of attacks on coalition troops in Iraq.

The shop owner, who refused to give his name, said the soldier had come into the DVD shop in the Kazimiyah neighbourhood in the northwest of the city and picked up two discs.

“He took out dollars from his pocket and as I looked at the money I heard a bang. He froze and then fell backwards,” the owner said.

“Two other soldiers came in, picked him up and took him away.”

Other witnesses corroborated the owner’s version. One said he saw a young man shooting the soldier at close quarters in the lower head.

The latest killing follows US military reports that another American soldier was killed in an ambush in southern Iraq. Officials also announced arrests in the possible abduction of two US servicemen.

The soldier was killed while investigating a car theft Thursday in Najaf, 100 miles southwest of Baghdad, a statement from US Central Command said. The soldier was attached to the 1st US Marine Expeditionary Force.

The soldier’s name was being withheld pending notification of relatives, Centcom said. It said the soldier died before a medical evacuation team arrived.

Also yesterday, Sgt Patrick Compton, a US military spokesman in Baghdad, said three suspects were detained in the disappearance of two American soldiers. US forces kept up ground and aerial searches in search of the two soldiers, Sgt Compton said.

The men were guarding the perimeter of a rocket demolition site near the town of Balad, north of Baghdad, on Wednesday when they failed to answer a radio call.

Just northwest of Baghdad yesterday morning, a US Army truck struck an explosive device on a dirt road. A US soldier and an eyewitness said wounded Americans were evacuated by helicopter. It was not clear what the explosive was.

The US soldier, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said the Americans were driving to Baghdad to make telephone calls to their families when the explosion happened.

Ambushes and hostile fire elsewhere in Iraq on Thursday killed at least one US soldier, two Iraqi civilians and wounded at least eight other Americans.