About 3,500 US soldiers who were part of last summer’s troop “surge” are scheduled to leave Iraq in the coming weeks, the US military said.
The soldiers, part of the 3rd Heavy Brigade Combat Team, will redeploy to Fort Benning, Georgia, said a statement released late on Monday.
The US sent some 30,000 additional troops into Iraq last summer to help stem growing violence. Those troops, along with the rise of Sunni fighters who allied with the US and began battling al-Qaeda and a truce called by a key Shiite militia, were credited with a sharp decrease in violence during the last 10 months.
PHOTO: AFP/US MARINE CORPS
The soldiers are part of the third of five “surge” brigades scheduled to redeploy. The other two are expected to return to the US by the end of July.
“The continued drawdown of surge brigades demonstrates continued progress in Iraq,” Brigadier General Dan Allyn said in the statement.
“After July, commanders will assess our security posture for about 45 days and determine future force requirements based on these conditions-based assessments,” he said.
Meanwhile, at least four civilians were killed overnight in the Baghdad Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City, hospital officials said yesterday. Some 21 people were injured at the same time.
Clashes in the sprawling slum of 2.5 million people have raged for five weeks, since the government began a crackdown on the militants in southern Iraq.
Hassan al-Rubaie, a Sadrist lawmaker, suspended his seat in parliament yesterday to protest the fighting in Sadr City. He said he held the government of Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki responsible for the fighting in the slum.
He also blamed Iran for interfering with Iraq’s security and said Tehran was causing much of the violence by supplying money, weapons and training to Iraqi fighters.
Suspected al-Qaeda operatives also kidnapped a pro-US tribal chief and family members yesterday, police said.
Gunmen grabbed Ibrahim Abdullah al-Mujamai, his wife, their daughter-in-law and a grandchild in a village in Diyala Province, said a local police official who declined to be named.
The official said the chieftain had been arranging for a Sunni militia group to protect his village against al-Qaeda attacks and to support US forces deployed in the country.
In other developments, a US terrorism expert said on Monday that more suicide attacks by women could be expected in the coming months.
“Between January and April, there were 12 suicide attacks by women in Iraq. That marks an exponential increase,” Farhana Ali, a US international policy analyst of Pakistani origin, said after a symposium on terrorism at the American Psychiatric Association’s annual meeting in Washington.
Twelve women carried out suicide attacks in the first few months of this year compared with 11 between 2003 and 2007, Ali said.
“So long as this conflict continues, you will see greater instability in Iraq and women will be greatly victimized — you will see more women in Iraq choose suicide terrorism in the next few months,” she said.
POLITICAL PRISONERS VS DEPORTEES: Venezuela’s prosecutor’s office slammed the call by El Salvador’s leader, accusing him of crimes against humanity Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele on Sunday proposed carrying out a prisoner swap with Venezuela, suggesting he would exchange Venezuelan deportees from the US his government has kept imprisoned for what he called “political prisoners” in Venezuela. In a post on X, directed at Venezuelan President Nicolas Maduro, Bukele listed off a number of family members of high-level opposition figures in Venezuela, journalists and activists detained during the South American government’s electoral crackdown last year. “The only reason they are imprisoned is for having opposed you and your electoral fraud,” he wrote to Maduro. “However, I want to propose a humanitarian agreement that
ECONOMIC WORRIES: The ruling PAP faces voters amid concerns that the city-state faces the possibility of a recession and job losses amid Washington’s tariffs Singapore yesterday finalized contestants for its general election on Saturday next week, with the ruling People’s Action Party (PAP) fielding 32 new candidates in the biggest refresh of the party that has ruled the city-state since independence in 1965. The move follows a pledge by Singaporean Prime Minister Lawrence Wong (黃循財), who took office last year and assumed the PAP leadership, to “bring in new blood, new ideas and new energy” to steer the country of 6 million people. His latest shake-up beats that of predecessors Lee Hsien Loong (李顯龍) and Goh Chok Tong (吳作棟), who replaced 24 and 11 politicians respectively
Young women standing idly around a park in Tokyo’s west suggest that a giant statue of Godzilla is not the only attraction for a record number of foreign tourists. Their faces lit by the cold glow of their phones, the women lining Okubo Park are evidence that sex tourism has developed as a dark flipside to the bustling Kabukicho nightlife district. Increasing numbers of foreign men are flocking to the area after seeing videos on social media. One of the women said that the area near Kabukicho, where Godzilla rumbles and belches smoke atop a cinema, has become a “real
‘WATER WARFARE’: A Pakistani official called India’s suspension of a 65-year-old treaty on the sharing of waters from the Indus River ‘a cowardly, illegal move’ Pakistan yesterday canceled visas for Indian nationals, closed its airspace for all Indian-owned or operated airlines, and suspended all trade with India, including to and from any third country. The retaliatory measures follow India’s decision to suspend visas for Pakistani nationals in the aftermath of a deadly attack by shooters in Kashmir that killed 26 people, mostly tourists. The rare attack on civilians shocked and outraged India and prompted calls for action against their country’s archenemy, Pakistan. New Delhi did not publicly produce evidence connecting the attack to its neighbor, but said it had “cross-border” links to Pakistan. Pakistan denied any connection to
RSS