6 Americans Die In Downed Copter
A commercial helicopter was shot down by missile fire north of the Iraqi capital Thursday, U.S. Embassy and military officials said, killing 11 people, six of them American civilians.
The MI-8 helicopter, contracted from Washington-based SkyLink Air and Logistic Support (USA) Inc., crashed at 1:45 p.m. local time, about 12 miles north of Baghdad.
In the Bulgarian capital, Sofia, Defense Ministry spokesman Vladimir Prelezov said three of the victims were Bulgarians, and the helicopter was brought down by a missile or missiles.
Later, the U.S. Embassy said six aboard the craft were Americans who worked for security contractor Blackwater USA, under contract to the U.S. Department of Defense. The other two aboard were Philippine bodyguards.
In other developments:
American military officials told Smucker three weeks ago that this was a region where foreign fighters were exploiting what they called "seams" in the American patrols. Now the American forces are going to be deployed there on a more permanent basis.
Helicopters are being used more in Iraq by American civilians, because of the danger on the roads, but they are vulnerable.
"They fly low, they fly fast, but they are not armed to the teeth like a U.S. military helicopter would be," said CBS News' Phil Ittner.
SkyLink says on its Web site that it specializes in "logistics" — transportation, airport management and aviation support services — in "unsecured and hostile environments." It is affiliated with SkyLink Aviation of Canada, and both companies are owned by a Canadian holding company.
Investigations indicated the 19 men whose bodies were found in the stadium had come from the southern Diwaniya and Najaf provinces to fish in Tharthar lake when they were captured by insurgents and taken to the stadium at nearby Haditha, said Saleh Sarhan, the ministry's chief spokesman. He did not say how the victims had been identified or why they might have been captured.
Iraq has seen a week of stepped up violence, much of it in the capital, as political leaders struggle to agree a new Cabinet from the country's complex mix of Sunnis, Shiites and Kurds nearly three months after Iraqis elected a 275-seat National Assembly.
The attack against Allawai's convoy knocked several vehicles off the road and apparently killed several of his body guards, reports Smucker.
It came on a day of multiple bombings and shootings in the embattled capital and elsewhere which killed at least 13 people and wounded 21.
They included an Australian security contractor and two other foreign nationals who died when unidentified assailants fired at their vehicle in Baghdad, Australian officials said in Sydney on Thursday.
Al Qaeda in Iraq claimed responsibility for several of the attacks, including the one on Allawi, in statements that surfaced on Web sites known for their militant content.
"Allawi escaped, but if one arrow missed its target, there are many others in the quiver," one of the statements said. It was not possible to verify the claims.
In Haditha, 140 miles northwest of Baghdad, residents heard gunshots Wednesday and rushed to the stadium, where they said they found the 19 bodies slumped against a bloodstained wall. All appeared to have been gunned down, witnesses said.
Residents initially said they believed the victims — all men in civilian clothes — were soldiers abducted by insurgents as they headed home for a holiday marking the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad. But residents and an Iraqi reporter saw no military identification on the bodies.
In October, insurgents ambushed and killed about 50 unarmed Iraqi soldiers as they headed home from a U.S. military training camp northeast of Baghdad.
Interim President Jalal Talabani also announced Wednesday the recovery of more than 50 bodies from the Tigris River, saying the discovery was proof of claims that dozens were abducted from an area south of the capital despite a fruitless search by Iraqi forces.
Talabani did not say when or where the 50 bodies were pulled from the river, but he said all had been identified as hostages.
"Terrorists committed crimes there. It is not true to say there were no hostages. There were. They were killed, and they threw the bodies into the Tigris," Talabani told reporters. "We have the full names of those who were killed and those criminals who committed these crimes."
Shiite leaders and government officials claimed last week that Sunni militants had abducted as many as 100 Shiites from the Madain area, 14 miles southeast of Baghdad. But when Iraqi forces moved into the town of 1,000 families, they found no captives, and residents said they had seen no evidence anyone had been seized.
Madain is at the tip of a Sunni militant stronghold known as the "Triangle of Death," where there have been numerous retaliatory kidnappings. Police and health officials said victims are sometimes killed and dumped in the river.
As summer approaches and temperatures start to rise, bodies have been floating to the surface, said Dr. Falah al-Permani of the Swera district health department. He said as many as 50 bodies have been recovered over the past three weeks. But it was not clear whether they were the bodies referred to by Talabani.