BAGHDAD, Iraq - As Iraqis awaited the inauguration of their new national
unity government, roadside bombs and other attacks killed five Iraqis and
wounded 18 people on Friday, including a U.S. soldier riding through Baghdad in
a minesweeper.
On Saturday, legislators plan to swear in a new prime minister and Cabinet,
completing a democratic transition that began in December with the election of
its parliament.
A main goal of the new government will be to restore security in Iraq, where
sectarian violence and attacks by insurgents and militias have killed many
people and led thousands of Iraqi families to flee their homes.
The Bush administration hopes that full-scale democracy can unite Iraq's
complex mix of Shiites, Sunni Arabs and Kurds, reduce public support for
insurgent groups and militias, and make it possible to begin withdrawing U.S.
troops sometime this year.
In a speech in Baghdad on Thursday night, U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad
praised Iraq's outgoing prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jaafari, and said the
inauguration will be a "historic step in Iraq's transition from dictatorship to
democracy."
Since the Iraq war began in March 2003, roadside bombs have been the
deadliest form of attack by insurgents, killing thousands of U.S. and Iraqi
soldiers and Iraqi police, often by hitting their convoys and patrols in cities
such as Baghdad.
On Friday, the day of worship in mostly Muslim Iraq, one such hidden bomb hit
a U.S. convoy in Dora, a mixed Sunni-Shiite-Christian area and one of the city's
most violent districts.
The blast heavily damaged the armored vehicle used by explosive ordnance
disposal teams to search for mines, which often are buried in the dirt beside
roads or in piles of garbage. One U.S. soldier was wounded and evacuated from
the site in south Baghdad, the U.S. command said.
Two other roadside bombs targeted Iraqi forces in the capital.
One exploded outside the home of a police officer in east Baghdad, said
police Lt. Ali Abbas. The officer was on patrol, but the explosion severely
wounded his wife and two children, Abbas said.
Insurgents often conduct such attacks in an effort to discourage Iraqis from
joining police forces or the Iraq army.
Another roadside bomb exploded near an Iraqi army patrol in western Baghdad,
wounding three soldiers, said police Lt. Maitham Abdul-Razzaq.
Police also found the bullet-ridden bodies of four Iraqis who had been
kidnapped and tortured by some of the many death squads that are active in the
capital. One of the victims was an elementary school teacher. Two of the four
bodies were found in Dora. Another beheaded, handcuffed body was found in
Numaniya, 80 miles southwest of Baghdad, said Hadi al-Itabi, an official at a
morgue in nearby Kut.
