BAGHDAD, Sept. 20, 2007
U.S.: Iranian Officer Arrested In Iraq
Alleged Quds Force Leader Said To Be Roadside Bomber, Insurgent Smuggler
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A boy peers into a damaged vehicle after an overnight raid in the Shiite enclave of Sadr City in Baghdad, Iraq on Thursday, Sept. 20, 2007. The U.S. military said a joint raid by Iraqi special forces and U.S. troops and helicopter gunships in Sadr City led to the detention of seven Shite extremists. (AP Photo/Karim Kadim)
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Members of a private security company pose on the rooftop of a house in Baghdad, Sept. 18, 2007. (AFP/Getty)
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A private U.S. security officer with his face covered against dust, sits in a Chinook helicopter as he accompanys Iraq's U.S. civilian administrator L. Paul Bremer on a visit to southern Iraq in this Thursday, Sept 18, 2003 file photo. The Iraqi Interior Ministry said Monday Sept. 17, 2007 that it was pulling the license of an American security firm allegedly involved in the fatal shooting of civilians during an attack on a U.S. State Department motorcade in Baghdad. (AP Photo/Karel Prinsloo)
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A helicopter owned by Blackwater USA flies over central Baghdad, Iraq, in this Feb. 7, 2007 file photo. (AP Photo/Marko Drobnjakovic)
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Blackwater USA employees receive instruction along a makeshift street scene before practicing a vehicle ambush response drill, in this Feb. 20, 2004, file photo, on Blackwater's land near Moyock, N.C. Blackwater has been linked by Iraqi officials to the deaths of eight Iraqi civilians in Baghdad. (AP Photo/Karen Tam)
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The suspect - a member of the Quds Force, an elite unit of Iran's Revolutionary Guards - was detained in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah, the military said.
He was allegedly involved in transporting roadside bombs, including armor-piercing explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, into Iraq, according to a statement. It said intelligence reports also indicated he was involved in the infiltration and training of foreign fighters in Iraq.
Officials have said the Bush administration is expected to soon blacklist the Quds force as a terrorist organization, subjecting part of the vast military operation to financial sanctions. The move would be in response to Iranian action in Iraq and elsewhere.
Also Thursday, the No. 2 U.S. commander in Iraq a 7-month-old security operation has reduced violence by 50 percent in Baghdad, but he acknowledged that civilians were still dying at too high a rate.
The comments came as relations between the U.S. and Iraqi governments remained strained in the wake of Sunday's shooting involving Blackwater USA security guards, which Iraqi officials said left at least 11 people dead. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki suggested the U.S. Embassy find another company to protect its diplomats.
The North Carolina-based company has said its employees acted "lawfully and appropriately" in response to an armed attack against a State Department convoy.
But a survivor who said he was three cars away from the convoy denied the American guards were under fire, claiming they apparently started shooting to disperse more than two dozen cars that were stuck in a traffic jam.
Lt. Gen. Raymond Odierno told reporters that car bombs and suicide attacks in Baghdad have fallen to their lowest level in a year, and civilian casualties have dropped from a high of about 32 to 12 per day.
He also said violence in Baghdad had seen a 50 percent decrease, although he did not provide details about how the numbers were obtained and said that was short of the military's objectives.
(AP Photo/Ali Abbas, Pool)
Al Qaeda in Iraq was "increasingly being pushed out of Baghdad, "seeking refuge outside" the capital and "even fleeing Iraq," Odierno said.
Iraqi military commander Lt. Gen. Abboud Qanbar said that before the surge, one-third of Baghdad's 507 districts were under insurgent control.
"Now, only five to six districts can be called hot areas," he said. "Al Qaeda now is left only with booby-trapped cars and roadside bombs as their only weapons, which cannot be called quality operations, and they do not worry us."
The assessment contradicts a message released Thursday in the form of a Web video, in which al Qaeda's second in command touts the "defeat" of American military efforts in both Iraq and Afghanistan. (Read more)
In other developments:
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- Its time to end the US-inspired terrorism in Iraq. Its way past time that our troops come home.
A million dead Iraqis since the Washington Regime''s launch of its war of aggression against Iraq is testimony to who the real terrorists are in Iraq.
What was Commissar Paul Bremer''s Fuehrer-Order #81?-- It outlawed the saving of seeds by the Iraqi farmers...Monsanto was the big beneficiary of this order. Ask yourself, does this sound like the act of a regime interested in promoting freedom for Iraqis, or the interests of the corporate beasts?
Arrest George W. Bush and his criminal War Pig Regime! Troops Home Now! The borders are open, the Constitution betrayed and Washington is enemy-occuppied territory. - Reply to this comment
- Would the unnamed author for this propaganda piece care to offer any substantiation for these claims, other than alleged, unspecified "intelligence reports", and the say-so of this war criminal, General Raymond Odierno?
I would like to take this opportuinity to mark this article as exhibit "L", in the case of CBS News complicity in the fomentation of an unjustifiable and illegal war of aggression against Iran.
Posted by FeelFree1 at 04:39 PM : Sep 20, 2007
It is fascinating how the authors of these stories never take credit isn''t it? Maybe they are written by a computer . . . no, more likely, a grad student intern, embarrassed of their work. - Reply to this comment
Prinzowhales,
Re: "How''s My Driving?"
Funny stuff!;-)- Reply to this comment
- From the standpoint of those who support peace, America has already failed in Iraq--1,000,000 Iraqi dead and 4,000,000 refugees...all for Oil and Israel.
As the Pentagram only counts as KIA, Americans who die on the ground in Iraq...our casualty count probably stands closer to 15,000 than the current number of close to 4,000.
We failed in the Gulf War as well--we have a quarter of a million on disability from this "cheap" war... all so an emir could squat on his gold commode and rule for the few--a few around the throne and a few around the New York banks. - Reply to this comment
- What I really want to know is why we continue to hear nothing about the investigation into Blackwater USA and their alleged smuggling of weapons into Iraq. Addtionally, why is nobody looking at the budgets of these "security contractors" Their expenditures should be totally transparant because after all, it is the American taxpayer who is paying these private companies. The American public needs to know the owners, the backers, and the substance of the contracts that these companies have. It should be public knowledge in prime time media. Senators, need to know that they have dropped the ball on this. While supporting the mercenaries to the hilt, they have failed to support our troops.
- Reply to this comment
- FeelFree1--The Quds force member was driving a semi tractor trailor truck with crates clearly marked in English, "EFP--Made In Iran-"...the truck had a sticker on the back that read: "How''s My Driving? 1-800-IAM-QUDS".
- Reply to this comment
Re: "An Iranian officer accused of smuggling powerful roadside bombs into Iraq for the elite Quds force was arrested Thursday, the military said."
"The suspect - a member of the Quds Force, an elite unit of Iran''s Revolutionary Guards - was detained in the Kurdish city of Sulaimaniyah, the military said."
"He was allegedly involved in transporting roadside bombs, including armor-piercing explosively formed penetrators, or EFPs, into Iraq, according to a statement. It said intelligence reports also indicated he was involved in the infiltration and training of foreign fighters in Iraq."
Would the unnamed author for this propaganda piece care to offer any substantiation for these claims, other than alleged, unspecified "intelligence reports", and the say-so of this war criminal, General Raymond Odierno?
I would like to take this opportuinity to mark this article as exhibit "L", in the case of CBS News complicity in the fomentation of an unjustifiable and illegal war of aggression against Iran.- Reply to this comment
The road ahead in Afghanistan, and the crucial decision Obama faces.
