US launches ‘largest air assault since 2003’

US TROOPS launched what was termed the largest air assault since the 2003 invasion of Iraq yesterday, targeting insurgent strongholds.

The Americans were joined by the Iraqi army.

"More than 1,500 Iraqi and coalition troops, over 200 tactical vehicles, and more than 50 aircraft participated in the operation," the US military statement said of the attack, designed to "clear a suspected insurgent operating area north-east of Samarra", 60 miles north of Baghdad.

The military said the operation was expected to continue over several days against insurgent targets in Salahuddin province, where Samarra is a key city.

The province is a major part of the so-called Sunni triangle where insurgents have been active for the past year and more.

Residents in the targeted area said there was a heavy US and Iraqi troop presence and large explosions could be heard in the distance. It was unclear if the blasts were due to fighting.

Near the end of the first day of the operation, the military said "a number of enemy weapons caches have been captured, containing artillery shells, explosives, IED-making (improvised explosive device) materials, and military uniforms".

Yesterday's assault was launched hours before Iraq's new parliament was sworn in, with parties still deadlocked over the next government, vehicles banned from Baghdad's streets to prevent car bombings and the country under the shadow of a feared civil war.

The first session, which took place within days of the third anniversary of the US-led invasion, lasted 30 minutes and was adjourned indefinitely because the legislature still has no speaker.

It was not clear from the US 101st Airborne Divison's initial statement exactly what was meant by characterising the attack as the largest air assault operation since the beginning of the Iraq war. It could refer to the number of aircraft involved or the amount of weaponry involved or some other measure of size.

There was no immediate word on whether any fighter jets or other fixed-wing warplanes had dropped bombs or fired missiles as part of the assault. Also left unsaid was how many of the 1,500 total troops involved are Iraqis.

Hoshyar Zebari, the Iraqi interim foreign minister, said the attack had been necessary to prevent insurgents from forming a new stronghold such as they had established in Fallujah, west of Baghdad.

He said: "After Fallujah and some of the operations carried out successfully in the Euphrates and Syrian border, many of the insurgents moved to areas nearer to Baghdad.

"They have to be pulled out by the roots."

Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, was the site of a massive bombing against a Shi'ite shrine on February 22 that sparked sectarian bloodshed that has killed more than 500 and injured hundreds more, threatening to push Iraq into civil war.

The military operation, residents said, appeared to be concentrated near four villages about 20 miles north of Samarra. The villages are near the highway leading from Samarra to the city of Adwar.

Adnan Pachachi, the senior politician who administered the oath to Iraqi legislators in the absence of a speaker, spoke of a country in crisis.

"We have to prove to the world that a civil war is not and will not take place among our people," Mr Pachachi told lawmakers.

"The danger is still looming and the enemies are ready for us because they do not like to see a united, strong, stable Iraq."

Even the oath was a source of disagreement, with the head of the committee that drafted the country's new constitution, Humam Hammoudi, protesting that lawmakers had strayed from the text. After brief consultations, judicial officials agreed the wording was acceptable.

A pianist played as representatives of Iraq's main ethnic and religious blocs many in traditional Arab and Kurdish dress filed into a convention centre behind the concrete blast walls of the heavily fortified Green Zone for parliament's first meeting.

Hours after the session adjourned, two mortar shells were fired into the Green Zone. No casualties were reported.

The inaugural session started the clock on a 60-day period in which parliament must elect a president and approve a prime minister and cabinet.