5 Iraqis in anti-al-Qaida groups killed

By JERUSALEM POST STAFF
Five Iraqis serving as local volunteer guards in a US-backed program were killed in insurgent violence in towns outside the Iraqi capital. Separately, a suspect believed responsible for coordinating roadside bombings in southern Iraq was captured, the US military said Saturday. Insurgents stormed a Sunni village just outside Iskandariyah, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of Baghdad, killing three of the members of a so-called Awakening Council and abducting five on Friday, including the village's tribal chief, according to Ahmed al-Azawi, spokesman for the Awakening Council and an Iskandariyah police officer. In Duluiyah, about 75 kilometers (45 miles) north of Baghdad, a suicide attacker cornered in his home by the local militia blew himself up, killing one of the fighters and wounding two, a police officer said. And just a few kilometers (miles) north of that attack, insurgents killed another of the local guards, another security official said. Both spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release details of the attack. Separately, police in southern Iraq captured a suspect believed responsible for supplying and coordinating roadside bomb attacks against American and Iraqi troops, the US military said Saturday. The American statement said the suspect, detained Friday in Nasiriyah, about 320 kilometers (200 miles) southeast of Baghdad, had traveled repeatedly to Iran and was found with Iranian weapons and munitions, including three new Iranian-made rockets and boosters, a launcher and AK-47 assault rifles and ammunition.