Troops locked in Fallujah battles

US forces battled insurgents around the rebel stronghold of Fallujah today as militants ambushed and killed nine Iraqi policemen returning from training in Jordan.

Fierce clashes between US troops and insurgents broke out on a highway east of Fallujah and in the southern part of the city, witnesses said.

The road, which leads to Baghdad, has been completely blocked. Residents reported fresh aerial and artillery attacks as explosions boomed across the city.

Plumes of smoke were seen rising from the Askari and Shuhada neighbourhoods in eastern and southern Fallujah as families began to flee the area, residents reported.

They said a Humvee was seen burning in the eastern edge of the city. Hospital officials said three civilians were injured in the clashes.

By dusk, US troops had pulled back, setting up a checkpoint southwest of the city, witnesses said.

In the Sadr City district of Baghdad, a mortar shell exploded at a sports stadium about 15 minutes before Prime Minister Ayad Allawi was due to arrive to inspect a programme under which Shiite militiamen are handing in weapons in return for cash.

The itinerary was quickly changed and Allawi instead visited several other sites before arriving at the stadium.

Fallujah, 40 miles west of the capital, is considered the toughest stronghold of insurgents.

Commanders have been speaking of a possible new offensive to wrest it from the militants’ control, and the Marines said on Saturday they had tightened their cordon around the city to keep suspected terrorists from fleeing the area.

Negotiations aimed at restoring government control in Fallujah without requiring a ground assault have faltered.

Fallujah clerics today repeated their offer to return to the negotiating table if the US stopped its bombing, while blaming the Iraqi government for the violence. Allawi had threatened military action if Fallujah didn’t turn over terror mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

“We are still ready to go back to the talks and open new channels of dialogue,” said negotiator Abdul Hamid Jadou.

But he said Allawi is “responsible for each drop of blood being spilled in Fallujah. This government sided with the Americans in bombing the innocent people who are fasting (on) Ramadan.”

Iraq’s interim government responded by renewing its call to Fallujah to hand over “terrorists” or face attack.

“The ongoing threat of terrorists to our people and the use of some areas and cities as a haven for them is something the government cannot accept or tolerate,” national security adviser Qassem Dawoud said.

Today’s fighting around Fallujah followed an overnight strike by US jets, blasting what the American command said was a checkpoint operated by the feared Tawhid and Jihad terror movement of Jordanian-born extremist al-Zarqawi. Three people were killed, according to the Fallujah hospital.

In Jordan, meanwhile, a military prosecutor charged al-Zarqawi and 12 other militants for an alleged al Qaida linked plot to attack the US Embassy in Amman and Jordanian government targets with chemical and conventional weapons, government officials said.

Al-Zarqawi and three others in the group are at large and will be tried in absentia, officials said.

The fighting in Fallujah came after a deadly two days for US forces. Two Americans were killed on Saturday when a pair of helicopters crashed south of Baghdad, and four US troops died in car bomb blasts in northern Iraq and near the Syrian border on Friday.

Along the Syrian border, clashes on Saturday between US troops and insurgents left four people dead and 13 others wounded, according to Dr Wael al-Duleimi from the hospital in the border town of Qaim today.

Meanwhile today, police said that nine Iraqi policemen returning from training in Jordan were ambushed and killed on their way home to Karbala.

The bus they were travelling in was attacked in Latifiyah, 25 miles south of Baghdad, said Karbala police spokesman Abdul-Rahman Mishawi. The attackers escaped.