14 June 2005 Rumours continue to circulate that the French government paid a de facto ransom for the release of the French journalist Florence Aubenas, held hostage for five months in Iraq. Her newspaper, Libération, appeared to give credence to the rumours by publishing a "log-book" or diary of the complex and confusing negotiations to win her release. The log-book, written over the past five months by the newspaper's deputy editorial director, Patrick Sabatier, suggests the motives of her kidnappers were financial. "Information received in Baghdad suggests that the kidnappers are ready to do a deal, having abandoned their maximalist demands," the diary records in April. "But the latest French offer does not yet satisfy them." However, M. Sabatier, in a separate article, said that Libération had not been told whether a ransom was paid. Mme Aubenas, 44, was released on Saturday. The bodies of 13 Iraqi men, some beheaded, have been taken to a Baghdad hospital, a doctor said today. Dr Mohammed Jawad of western Baghdad's Yarmouk Hospital said the bodies - either decapitated or shot in the head - were brought to the hospital late last night from near Khaldiyah, a town 75 miles west of Baghdad. Jawad said the bodies might belong to men who have been missing since their convoy that was delivering supplies for the US military was ambushed near Khaldiyah last Thursday. Two of the bodies were identified as an Iraqi policeman and an interpreter, but it was not immediately clear which company they worked for. Thursday's attack was the second against a convoy transporting goods for American forces this week west of Baghdad, a region notorious for kidnappings and ambushes. In the first attack, footage showing the bodies of at least 15 men was obtained. BAGHDAD, Iraq -- Insurgents on Monday launched four suicide car bombings and other attacks around Iraq that killed at least 14 people. Twenty-two other Iraqis were wounded after militants opened fire on authorities trying to evacuate the injured from one of the blast sites in the northern city of Samara. A car bomb exploded several hundred yards from an armed convoy carrying a U.S. diplomat in Baghdad on Monday, but the official was unhurt, the embassy said. State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said there had been an explosion but the convoy was not the target. Already tense relations soured further Monday between the majority Shiites, who dominate the government and parliament, and the Sunni Arabs, whom many hold responsible for the insurgency. Strong disagreements broke out over the number of representatives the once-powerful Sunni minority will have on a committee drafting the country's constitution. Shiite lawmakers rejected calls for increasing Sunni representatives to 25 from 15 on the 55-member drafting committee. Sunnis renewed threats to boycott and sink the charter. Limited or no Sunni participation on the committee would rob the charter of its legitimacy. When the draft is put to a nationwide referendum, it is likely that at least three of the four predominantly Sunni Arab provinces in Iraq will vote against it, causing the measure to fail and parliament to dissolve. President Bush spoke Monday with Iraqi President Jalal Talabani and stressed the importance of completing a draft of the constitution. The leaders also discussed the importance of having all groups in Iraqi society represented in the constitutional process, White House press secretary Scott McClellan said. Also Monday, radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr met with the Russian ambassador and tribal chiefs from the insurgent hotbeds of Fallujah and Ramadi. The meeting between al-Sadr and Russian Ambassador Vladimir Chamov in the Shiite holy city of Najaf, south of the capital, seemed to be a sign of the cleric's desire to return to active politics after going into isolation last fall following clashes between his militia and U.S. troops. In northern Iraq, tribal chiefs agreed Monday to hand over terror suspects to Iraqi security forces, Iraq's Defense Ministry said. The agreement represents a blow to an insurgency that has been rampant in northern areas such as Mosul and Tal Afar and is bent on derailing the new government. A blast ripped through waiting civil servants outside a bank in the northern Iraqi oil hub of Kirkuk, killing at least 19 people and wounding 53 others, police said. A suicide bomber blew himself up amidst public workers standing outside the al-Rafidain bank in the city centre, Kirkuk Police Chief Major General Turhan Yusif said. According to Colonel Shirzad Abdullah, Chief of the Rahimao Police Station: "Most of the casualties were civil servants lining up outside the bank to receive their monthly pay." The blast came shortly before Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani was to be sworn in as President of three provinces in northern Iraq, an event that seals their long fought-for autonomy but does not resolve the disputed status of Kirkuk. Meanwhile, 10 Iraqis, including two children, were killed and seven wounded by a car bomb north of Baghdad, according to security and hospital sources. "Ten people were killed in all and seven wounded," an Iraqi army officer said, adding four deaths among his own soldiers to an earlier report of six dead and four wounded. The troops had been called in to reinforce a police station in the town of Kanaan that was under mortar attack, and were targeted by a car bomb parked nearby, a police officer said. Bureau Report — A bomb exploded outside a bank in this northern city Tuesday, killing 19 people, including child street vendors and pensioners waiting for their checks. In Baghdad, the bodies of 24 men killed in ambushes were brought to a hospital. A suicide car bomber also rammed his vehicle into an Iraqi army checkpoint, killing five soldiers and wounding two others in Kan'an, about 30 miles north of Baghdad, Iraqi Army Col. Ismael Ibrahim said. Two civilians were also wounded. Two U.S. soldiers were killed Monday when a roadside bomb exploded next to their vehicle near the battleground city of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, the military said Tuesday. At least 1,703 U.S. military members have died since the war began in 2003, according to an Associated Press count. The attack in Kirkuk was allegedly claimed in an Internet posting by al-Qaida in Iraq, and it came as the Shiite-dominated government of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari received a near overwhelming vote of confidence in the Iraqi National Assembly on a promise to help restore security to violence-torn Iraq. Al-Jaafari's 37-member government, announced on April 28, was approved by a show of hands in the 275-member parliament. Although it has made quashing the insurgency its top priority, his government has been criticized for its seeming inability to stop a wave of attacks that have killed more than 1,000 people since its inception. Security forces captured a reported key member of Abu-Musab al-Zarqawi's al-Qaida in Iraq terrorist group who is accused of building and selling cars used by suicide bombers, the Iraqi government said Tuesday. He was identified as Jassim Hazan Hamadi al-Bazi, also known as Abu Ahmed, and was arrested June 7, the government said. It added that he was part of an al-Qaida cell run by a man identified as Hussayn Ibrahim. The spree of killings comes as lawmakers wrangle over how big a say Sunni Arab Muslims should have drawing up the country's new constitution. The dispute threatens to further alienate Sunni Arabs, who fell from power after their patron, Saddam Hussein, was ousted and detained. Sunni Arabs account for most of the insurgents wreaking havoc across Iraq. Sgt. Larry R. Arnold of Carriere worried during a short visit home in May about those he'd left behind in Iraq, including his son, his wife said. Arnold returned to his unit, and son, Robert, 21, who has been serving alongside his father with the same company, came home Friday for a two-week visit. "We all knew there was a possibility one or both would not come back," Melinda Arnold said Monday. And now she knows at least one won't. Her husband of nearly 25 years was one of two soldiers with the Mississippi National Guard's 155th Brigade Combat Team killed Saturday near Baghdad after a roadside bomb exploded near their vehicle. Also killed was Spc. Terrance D. Lee, 25, of Moss Point. Both were assigned to the Mississippi National Guard's Company B, 150th Combat Engineer Battalion in Lucedale. The explosion occurred in Iraq around 6:30 p.m. Saturday near Owesat Village about 25-30 miles south of Baghdad, Mississippi National Guard spokesman Lt. Col. Tim Powell said. "You see their young faces at Camp Shelby (where they trained) then something happens to them," Powell said of the two soldiers. "It's tough to take. I can't imagine how their families feel." There have been 12 casualties in this brigade since the start of the Iraq war, Powell said, adding that the Mississippi National Guard has had a total of 16 soldiers killed from around the state. Since operations began in Iraq and Afghanistan, 35 people with Mississippi ties have died. An electrician, Larry Arnold, 46, made the National Guard his full-time job in 2002, Melinda Arnold said. She remembers her husband as "a caring and dedicated soldier." A member of the U.S. Army for 8 1/2 years, Larry Arnold joined the National Guard in 1991, his wife said. "Any decision he made on re-enlisting ... that was his decision. I would back him 110 percent," Melinda Arnold said. The couple met on a blind date in March 1977. "It was love at first sight," she said, adding that they were married in August of that year. Larry Arnold also leaves two other sons — Larry Jr., 25, and Howard, 19 — and two grandchildren. Lee deployed to Iraq Jan. 14 with the brigade. Lee, a National Guard supply specialist, was a 1999 graduate of Moss Point High and joined the Guard in 2002. Lee's wife, Stephanie, is expecting their child in September. "It's so hard. He would do anything for me," Stephanie Lee said. The couple met at Northrop Grumman Ship Systems, where they both worked. Terrance Lee, a five-year employee of Northrop, was a 1st class welder and she is a pipe fitter. Stephanie Lee said the last time she saw her husband was the day he left Mississippi for Iraq. "He loved to talk. He loved to laugh. He didn't meet any strangers," Stephanie Lee said. "He lived to the fullest. He didn't let anything bother him." Terrance Lee also leaves two sons, Terrance Jr., 5, and Ramone, 3. The bodies of the two men are expected to be returned by mid-week, Powell said. No funeral arrangements have been made, he said. img align=left src=../news_images/world/14-Jun-05-9d42b4d6-2119-488f-aea2-1cd63a8f7227iraq-killings1_lpic.jpg BAGHDAD: At least 25 people were killed and scores injured in Iraq bombings. A suicide bomber killed at least 19 people and wounded 53 at a crowded market in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Tuesday, a senior police officer said. The bomber walked up to people shopping at the market in the centre of town, Colonel Beistun Mohammed said. Six Iraqis, including two children, were killed and four wounded early on Tuesday by a car bomb explosion north of Baghdad, security and hospital sources said. "The attack occurred at a market in the town of Kanaan," north of Baghdad, an Iraqi army officer said. "Two policemen and four civilians, including two children below the age of 10, were killed and four civilians wounded when the car exploded as a police patrol passed by," he said. A hospital director in Baquba said his teams had treated four people for wounds after they were brought in from the nearby town. Iraqi police have discovered two dozen bodies, including 17 employees of an Iraqi security firm, dumped west of Baghdad. The 17 bodies were found near Habbaniya, a town about 100 km(60 miles) west of Baghdad, late on Monday, a source in the Interior Ministry said. It was not clear how or when they were killed. In the past few weeks, dozens of bodies have been found in the vast Anbar province west of Baghdad, a focal point of the insurgency, many of them shot in the head and some of them bound. Iraq, Military, 6/14/2005 Some 29 Iraqis were killed on Monday in various operations in several areas of Iraq. The most violent of which were three booby trapped explosions in Baghdad, Tikrit and Samera leaving behind 7 killed persons and 20 injured. Four members of the Iraqi police were killed in an attack which targeted them in Baqouba to the north east of Baghdad while other 17 were killed and 6 bodies were found in different areas in Baghdad. In another field development, an American diplomat, who was not identified, survived death of an attack by a booby trapped car in Baghdad that resulted in killing two Iraqis and injuring other four. A spokesman for Washington's embassy said that the diplomat was at the site of the explosion when the attack took place, adding that there is "no link between the attack and the moves of the diplomat." Witnesses said that one American military vehicle was set on fire, stressing that three American soldiers were evacuated from the place. Previous Stories: Moussa ready to visit Iraq at any time when need arises June 14, 2005 6:56 a.m. EST Niladri Sekhar Nath - All Headline News Foreign Correspondant BAGHDAD, Iraq (AHN) – Bombing attacks in northern Iraq left at least 29 people dead and 60 wounded. The first explosion took place outside a bank in Kirkuk when a suicide bomber blew himself up when some civil servants were waiting in from of Al-Rafidain bank in the city center. At least 19 people were killed and 53 injured in the blast. "Most of the casualties were civil servants lining up outside the bank to receive their monthly pay," AFP quoted Colonel Shirzad Abdullah, chief of the Rahimao police station as saying. The blast took place shortly before Kurdish leader Massoud Barzani was to be sworn in as president of three provinces in northern Iraq. In another explosion, 10 Iraqis were killed and seven wounded when a car bomb was detonated in north of Baghdad. Two children and four Iraqi soldiers were among those who had died in the explosion. A police officer stated that troops had been summoned to strengthen a police station in the town of Kanaan where the mishap occurred. The “Association of Muslim Scholars” is the most-quoted voice of Iraq’s Sunni Arab population. Since the “Iraqi insurgency” is almost exclusively composed of Sunni Arabs, fighting to maintain their traditional place as the masters of Iraq, the Association of Muslim Scholars (AMS) generally serves as a mouthpiece and apologist for the insurgency, playing Sinn Fein to the terrorists’ Irish Republican Army, so to speak. The AMS led the Sunni Arab boycott of elections this year, claiming that any election held with infidel occupiers in the country was illegitimate. (It was probably just a coincidence that any fair election was certain to be won by a coalition of Shiite Arabs and Sunni Kurds, who together comprise 80% of the population and both of which suffered greatly at the hands of Saddam Hussein and his fellow Sunni Arab supporters. The Sunni Arab boycott simply increased the magnitude of the power shift.) The AMS, of course, condemns violence, yet it financially supports the families of “martyrs” killed fighting the American Military and is always ready to issue press releases remarkably sympathetic to the insurgents. On the eve of the joint US/Iraqi re-conquest of Fallujah, the AMS issued a statement reminding all Iraqi soldiers and police that “The people” in this case being the noble terrorists then holed up in Fallujah, that are even now blowing up Iraqi civilians by the truckload in a bid to plunge the country into anarchy, so that they can rebuild it in their image. But this week the AMS finally had enough of terrorism, calling for an investigation into a shallow mass grave found outside Baghdad containing the bodies of 20 men, killed execution-style. Why the change of heart? The men in the grave are believed to be Sunni Arabs – and it wasn’t the American “infidels” that put them in the ground. The violence that the Sunni Arab Terrorists have visited upon the Shiites and Kurds is, increasingly, being reciprocated. It is tempting to speculate that a turning point has quietly been reached in Iraq. The American occupation of Iraq was condemned loudly by many Sunni Arabs as the worst of all possibilities. However, two months into Iraq’s first fairly elected government, the Sunni Arabs have found someone they dread more than Uncle Sam: their fellow Iraqis. The Shiite dominated government is becoming increasingly aggressive in its efforts to end the insurgency, and unlike the American forces, they aren’t worried about the op-ed page of the New York as they go about the ugly business of War. In a remarkable piece from the AP, many Sunni leaders practically pined for the good old days when they were just fighting Americans. The new Iraqi Government forces are not clamping down on the whole populace or conducting random searches at roadblocks, either. They are singling out the Sunni Arabs for extra attention as if they had never heard of the horrors of “ethnic profiling.” Apparently, you can only massacre people in the streets for a year or two before they start taking it personally. America has always been blessed by having stupid adversaries. This is fortunate, since oftentimes our Wars seem to be a race to stupid that America only narrowly loses. In Iraq, again, we have been blessed with stupid foes. The only hope the Sunni Arabs have of winning their insurgency in the long-term, is to unite a plurality of Iraqis behind their false banner of fighting the “foreign occupier.” If, on the other hand, the non-Sunni Arab majority of Iraqis decide to unite behind the elected government and fight, the Sunni Arabs are doomed to defeat –and perhaps much worse. Yet the open strategy of the so-called insurgents is to a civil war with Shiites and Kurds. The insurgents have set off car bomb after car bomb at Kurdish sites and Shiite Mosques, assassinated prominent Shiite leaders, and allied themselves with foreign anti-Shiite zealots such as Abu Musab “Kill Iraqis to Save Iraq” Al-Zarqawi. Such major mistakes by our enemy are even more important than they should be, because America – burdened by a media establishment that trumpets only our mistakes – is incompetent in the propaganda aspects of War. Even when right, we seem unable to demoralize foes and inspire allies. But we don’t have to inspire our own allies in Iraq. Our enemies have that covered. Consider just one recent example of how the Sunni Arab insurgents are making sure that fellow Iraqis get deadly serious in fighting them. This weekend, the insurgents tried –and failed – to kill the leader of Iraq’s special forces, General Rashid Flaiyeh – . Now I’m no psychologist, but I have to believe that Gen. Flaiyeh has a very short “To-Do” list for the upcoming decade or so. Of course, there is always the danger that the Special Forces might not share the General’s newfound enthusiasm for aggression, right? Nope. The insurgents sent a suicide bomber into the headquarters of the Shiite-dominated Special Forces “Wolf Brigade” the day before, killing five and angering hundreds. The Wolf Brigade was targeted because it has taken – allegedly – a different approach than America to combating an insurgency run by Sunni Arab religious leaders: they are killing Sunni Arab religious leaders. Curiously direct, I know, but you have to remember that those third world types aren’t as smart as we are and thus they have a tendency to kill their enemies even if Amnesty International and the Washington might get all huffy about it. After the attacks of this weekend, the Wolf Brigade will no doubt retreat to Cape Cod and hold a series of “discovery sessions” on how they could better address the sociological root causes of terrorism in Iraq. Either that, or they might go kill some disloyal Sunni Arab religious leaders. In a remarkable coincidence to the increasingly Iraqi face of the war, the Iraqi Government announced that it had been contacted last week by several Sunni Arab insurgent groups interested in laying down their arms and joining the political process. Apparently, fighting people who speak your language, have allies in your neighborhood, will never “withdraw”, and aren’t afraid to knock on your door one night and take you on a brief tour of a recently dug hole in the desert is not nearly as much fun as sniping at an American kid from Kansas sent to direct traffic out in the open and very much prohibited from asking you questions with a pair of pliers and a blow-torch should you miss. Although you would never know it to listen to most of the reports of the Mainstream Media in America, the odds appear to be increasingly stacked against the insurgents in the long-term. Let’s hope that the growing coalition of Anti-War leftists, poll-reading moderates, and isolationist “I was Right” Wingers calling for our immediate withdrawal from Iraq don’t manage to win the race to stupid before the insurgents. Mr. Johnson is a freelance writer and medical researcher living in Cambridge, MA. His published commentaries can be viewed at www.macjohnson.com. For a no-risk, trial subscription to HUMAN EVENTS, please click here. — Six in 10 Americans say they think the United States should withdraw some or all of its troops from Iraq the highest number who have said that in the Gallup poll. About three in 10 want the U.S. to withdraw all troops now and about three in 10 said some troops should be withdrawn now. A majority, 56 percent, said they would be upset if more troops are sent to Iraq, according to the poll released Monday. Two-thirds in an ABC-Washington Post poll, also taken in early June, say they think the United States has gotten bogged down in the war in Iraq. Almost six in 10 in both polls said the war was not worth fighting. has reported. The briefing paper indicated top British officials viewed the US administration as inevitably invading Iraq but said "little thought" had been given to "the aftermath and how to shape it," the newspaper reported, quoting from the eight-page memo. Mr Blair's staff produced the July 21, 2002, memo in preparation for his meeting with his national security staff two days later at Downing Street. "A post-war occupation of Iraq could lead to a protracted and costly nation-building exercise," the memo said. "As already made clear, the US military plans are virtually silent on this point. Washington could look to us to share a disproportionate share of the burden." The White House said there was "significant" post-war planning for Iraq and disputed the memo's characterisation. "More importantly, the memo in question was written eight months before the war began - there was significant post-war planning in the time that elapsed," David Almacy, a White House spokesman, said. "Some things we prepared for did not happen, like large numbers of refugees needing humanitarian assistance. "And others we did not expect, such as large numbers of regime elements fleeing the battlefield only to return later." The report of the July 21 memo comes after the minutes of the subsequent Downing Street meeting were published by London's on May 1 and became known as the Downing Street memo. The minutes said Britain's spy chief had concluded after a trip to Washington that "intelligence and facts were being fixed" to make the case for war in Iraq, an assertion that US officials and Mr Blair have denied. The death toll continues to mount from a violent insurgency that has killed hundreds of US troops and Iraqi civilians. The US, which led the invasion in March 2003, has said it will not pull out until Iraqi forces are trained to take over security for their country.