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U.S. F-14s bomb building, kill 7

By The Associated Press Wednesday, January 4, 2006
BAGHDAD -- U.S. aircraft bombed a building where suspected insurgents were hiding north of Baghdad, killing seven people and wounding four, Iraqi police said Tuesday.

The bombing took place late Monday in Beiji, site of Iraq's largest oil refinery, said Iraqi police Capt. Arkan Jassim, who reported the casualty figures.

The U.S. military did not comment on the deaths. It said only that an unmanned aircraft spotted three men planting a roadside bomb in the city 155 miles north of Baghdad, and that Navy F-14s bombed a nearby building the three had entered.

AP Television News video showed dozens of people gathered Tuesday near the rubble of the building. Men carried several bodies wrapped in carpets from the rubble, chanting, "There is no God but God!"

The Beiji refinery stopped production Dec. 18 because tanker truck drivers refused to make deliveries across dangerous desert roads. Iraqi officials said Monday that the refinery resumed supplying Baghdad and other cities after taking security precautions for drivers.

In northeastern Baghdad, the sister of Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabr was kidnapped yesterday by gunmen who killed one of her bodyguards and seriously wounded another, said Adnan Thabet, commander of the Interior Ministry's special forces.

Also yesterday, the nephew of Maj. Gen. Ali Al-Yasiri, commander of the Baghdad rescue police, was kidnapped, Hussein said.

In other violence, eight people were killed yesterday in three attacks in Baghdad.

Gunmen attacked a car carrying construction workers in a western neighborhood, killing three, police Capt. Qasim Hussein said. Another car carrying civilians was fired on in the same area, killing two people, said police 1st Lt. Thair Mahmoud. Three civilians elsewhere in Baghdad were shot to death, police said.

Meanwhile, an international team began reviewing the hundreds of complaints filed over Iraq's parliamentary elections, and an Iraqi elections official said yesterday that results might not be ready for two more weeks.

In other developments:

  • Oil Minister Ahmad Chalabi met with coalition officials to discuss ways to bring the oil refinery in Beiji -- Iraq's largest -- back online after it stopped production Dec. 18 because tanker truck drivers refused to make deliveries across dangerous desert roads. Chalabi said recent attacks on the country's oil pipelines make it clear that insurgents are trying to prevent the refinery from operating.

  • The satellite news channel Al-Arabiya showed footage of Jordanian hostage Mahmoud Suleiman Saidat. His captors said they had given Jordan's government more time to meet demands that it cut ties with the Baghdad government and free a female would-be suicide bomber whose explosives belt failed to go off during Nov. 9 attacks that killed 60 people in Amman.


    Copyright 2009 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

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