Baghdad, Dec 17: Saddam Hussein loyalists rioted in Baghdad, ambushed a US patrol in Samarra, stormed the office of a US-backed mayor in Fallujah and battled american troops in Ramadi - making it clear that Saddam's capture has not quelled violence in Iraq.
As the guerrilla attacks continued, troops snared a leader of the insurgency and 78 other people in a raid north of Baghdad, not far from where Saddam was captured three days earlier, the US military said yesterday.
A roadside bomb wounded three American soldiers in Saddam's hometown of Tikrit, and a pro-Saddam demonstration in the northern city of Mosul ended in violence, with a policeman killed and a second injured.
The raid in the village of Abu Safa, near Samarra and about 100 km north of Baghdad, began late Monday after insurgents in Samarra ambushed US forces. The US military said yesterday that its troops killed 11 of the attackers, who released a flock of pigeons to signal one another that the American patrol was in range. No Americans were hurt.
By early Tuesday, US troops arrested Qais Hattam, the No. 5 fugitive on the US Army's list of "high value targets”. The guerrilla leader was described as a major financier of insurgents who have been fighting the US-led coalition for months.
Bureau Report
