Iraqi Police

BAGHDAD -- US officials are worried that Iraqi police -- not just impostors in Iraqi uniforms -- may have been behind the killings of two coalition staff members and their translator, the top American general in Iraq said yesterday. The three were the first civilians from the US occupation authority to be killed in Iraq. One of the Americans was 33-year-old Fern Holland, a human rights specialist from Oklahoma who worked on women's issues in the Hillah region where she was killed.

BAGHDAD — Assailants waving the battle flag of Al Qaeda gunned down 25 police officers Monday in a brazen and well-orchestrated challenge to government control over a strategic town fraught with Iraq war symbolism. The attack replicated tactics used by Sunni insurgents during the war and appeared aimed at reasserting Al Qaeda's grip now that the Iraqis can no longer rely on American help. The attackers drove through the town of Haditha claiming to be government officials and methodically executed guards and commanders.

BAGHDAD -- Egypt's top diplomat in Iraq, who was to become the first ambassador from an Arab nation here, was missing yesterday after apparently being abducted near his home, authorities said. Ihab al-Sherif, head of Egypt's diplomatic mission in Baghdad, disappeared after going out Saturday. His vehicle was found next to a newsstand near his home. Witnesses reportedly said he was taken by gunmen who beat him and called him an "American spy. " Kidnappings and beheadings have become commonplace in Iraq, but Sherif is the first person of his rank to be seized.

BAGHDAD — A suicide bomber detonated his car yesterday as a group of police recruits left their academy in Baghdad, killing 20 in the latest strike on security officials that angry residents blamed on political feuding that is roiling Iraq. Police said the suicide bomber was waiting on the street outside the fortified academy near the Interior Ministry in an eastern neighborhood in the Iraqi capital. As the crowd of recruits exited the compound's security barriers around 1 p.m. and walked into the road, police said the bomber drove toward them and blew up his car. "We heard...

BAGHDAD - Suicide attackers struck near a Shi’ite mosque north of Baghdad and a checkpoint west of the capital yesterday as bombings killed at least 17 people nationwide. The violence was concentrated in former Sunni insurgent strongholds that have seen a sharp decline in violence after local tribal leaders turned against Al Qaeda in Iraq. Despite the relative calm, a series of deadly bombings have raised concerns about a resurgence of violence as the US military scales back its presence, with a full withdrawal planned by the end of 2011.

BAGHDAD - Iraq will assign police officers to safeguard its archeological heritage, the government said yesterday, announcing plans to protect sites such as the ancient city of Babylon that were left vulnerable to looting after the US invasion in 2003. Iraqi forces are preparing to take over their own security under a recently approved pact with the United States that requires US troops to withdraw by the end of 2011. Lieutenant General Hussein al-Awadi, the commander of Iraq's National Police force, said a new agency will be created to secure archeological sites,...

BAGHDAD -- Dozens of gunmen swooped into a police chief's home yesterday, killing his wife and two brothers, and kidnapping three of his grown children. The chief wasn't there, but the attack showed the dangers facing Iraqi forces as they try to take over the country's security so US forces can leave. The attackers, armed with machine guns and rifles, drove up at 6:30 a.m., then battled their way into Colonel Ali Dilayan al-Jorani's house on the outskirts of Baqubah, in Diyala province 35 miles northeast of the capital, according to officers at the provincial police...

BAGHDAD — Assailants waving the battle flag of Al Qaeda gunned down 25 police officers Monday in a brazen and well-orchestrated challenge to government control over a strategic town fraught with Iraq war symbolism. The attack replicated tactics used by Sunni insurgents during the war and appeared aimed at reasserting Al Qaeda's grip now that the Iraqis can no longer rely on American help. The attackers drove through the town of Haditha claiming to be government officials and methodically executed guards and commanders.

BAGHDAD — Police commander Lieutenant Colonel Shamil al-Jabouri knew Al Qaeda wanted him dead. He was renowned in the tense northern city of Mosul for his relentless pursuit of the terror group, and insurgents had tried at least five times to kill him. On the sixth attempt, Al Qaeda left little to chance. As Jabouri slept yesterday morning on a couch in his office, three men wearing police uniforms over vests laden with explosives slipped through an opening in the blast walls surrounding the compound where his building stood, police said.

BAGHDAD -- About 4,000 Iraqi police have been killed and more than 8,000 wounded in the past two years, the US commander in charge of police training said yesterday, but he said the force's performance was improving and officials are working to weed out militiamen. Beefing up Iraq's security forces is a cornerstone of efforts to stop the violence that has torn the country since the fall of Saddam Hussein in 2003. Police have been a prime target for attacks by Sunni insurgents. Sunnis accuse the Shi'ite-led police of helping fuel sectarian violence that has...

BAGHDAD - The governor of Iraq's largest Sunni province escaped an assassination attempt yesterday on a highway in a former insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad. Iraqi police say the governor of Anbar province, Qasim al-Fahadawi, escaped unhurt after a roadside bomb hit his motorcade as it headed to Baghdad. Fahadawi, a former businessman who worked with the US military for years to revitalize the sprawling desert province, has been a frequent target for insurgents. He lost a leg in a 2009 bombing at his office in the city of Ramadi.

BAGHDAD - Gunmen disguised as police officers seized control of a police station in western Iraq yesterday morning, killing four people and taking dozens of hostages before Iraqi forces swept in and ended the standoff, Iraqi officials said. The three-hour hostage crisis demonstrated the vulnerability of the Iraqi security forces as American troops swiftly draw down their presence after more than eight years of war. Four insurgents wearing explosives vests under police uniforms and armed with grenades and pistols with silencers walked into the police...

The U.S. will not “walk away’’ from the challenge of Iran’s stepped-up arming of Iraqi insurgents who are targeting and killing American troops as they prepare to leave Iraq, U.S. Defense Secretary Leon Panetta said Monday. Panetta also pointedly pressed Iraqi leaders to appoint a defense minister, after more than a year of indecision, and to make up their minds about asking the U.S. to keep a military presence here beyond December. “Damn it, make a decision,’’ he told a group of soldiers on his first visit to Iraq as Pentagon chief.

Army Reserve Sergeant William Curran, 26, knew he was in trouble when the Humvee he was driving in Iraq was hit by an improvised explosive device. But when a second IED hit his squad as it tried to secure an area in the eastern part of Baghdad on Aug. 28, 2008, things became even worse. “Obviously it was a chaotic situation,’’ said Curran, a Shrewsbury resident and reservist with the 344th Military Police Company based in Worcester. “When the second one hit … the mission changed from securing the area to getting evacuated as quickly as...

algeria ALGIERS — Helmeted riot police armed with batons and shields yesterday clashed with protesters throwing rocks and chairs who tried to march in defiance of Algeria’s ban on public gatherings. At least 19 people were injured, the government said, but an opposition party official put the figure at more than 40. Algeria has been among the many North African and Middle Eastern countries hit by shows of resistance against their autocratic leaders after a young Tunisian man set himself on fire last month.

BAGHDAD — Police commander Lieutenant Colonel Shamil al-Jabouri knew Al Qaeda wanted him dead. He was renowned in the tense northern city of Mosul for his relentless pursuit of the terror group, and insurgents had tried at least five times to kill him. On the sixth attempt, Al Qaeda left little to chance. As Jabouri slept yesterday morning on a couch in his office, three men wearing police uniforms over vests laden with explosives slipped through an opening in the blast walls surrounding the compound where his building stood, police said.

BAGHDAD -- The number of Iraqi police killed in guerrilla attacks is approaching the number of US soldiers killed during the occupation, evidence of both the Iraqis' increased role and the insurgents' strategy of targeting them, military officials said yesterday. Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld noted the losses on a visit to Baghdad to review security in the occupied nation. "There have been a lot of Iraqi policemen and women killed in the last six to eight months," he said.

BAGHDAD - Three roadside bombs planted in succession struck a police convoy in one of Iraq's most dangerous provinces yesterday, killing five policemen. In Baghdad, the leader of a Sunni group allied with the United States died when his booby-trapped car exploded. The bombs planted along a main thoroughfare targeted a police convoy in Jalawla, 60 miles north of Baghdad, said Ibrahim Bajilan, head of the provincial council of Diyala. The province, northeast of Baghdad and bordering Iran, remains a major security challenge for the US-backed Iraqi government, even as...

BAGHDAD — A suicide attacker in an explosives-rigged car bombed US and Iraqi forces on joint patrol yesterday, killing two Americans and at least three Iraqis. The bomber struck the convoy of Humvees and Stryker vehicles in the town of Jalula, about 80 miles northeast of Baghdad, not far from the Iranian border, according to Iraqi officials. The US military, which confirmed the casualties, said another six American troops were wounded in the attack. Although US forces have largely pulled back from urban areas as Iraqis take responsibility for securing their country, yesterday’s attack...