BAGHDAD – Three American soldiers were killed and one wounded in separate incidents in central and northern Iraq on Saturday, the deadliest day for US forces here since July.
The deaths were a stark reminder that, despite Washington having declared combat operations over in August, its 50,000-odd troops still stationed here remain at risk. Saturday’s worst incident saw two soldiers killed and one wounded “while conducting operations in northern Iraq,” a statement said, without giving further details.
Major Rob Phillips, a US army spokesman, said the incident occurred in the northern city of Mosul, where an Iraqi army officer earlier said two Iraqi soldiers opened fire on their American counterparts at a training centre. Neither Phillips nor the Iraqi officer linked those deaths to that shooting.
Earlier, the Iraqi told AFP that the shooting, at the Al-Ghazlani training centre in west Mosul, was intentional but that it was unclear what provoked the incident. He said three US troops had been wounded. The incident marks at least the second time in recent months that an Iraqi soldier has fired on his US counterparts. Two US troops were killed and nine wounded when an Iraqi soldier opened fire in northern Iraq on September 7.
Separately, a third US soldier was killed on Saturday “while conducting operations in central Iraq”, a US statement said, without providing details.
The death toll was the highest in a single day for American forces since July 2, when three soldiers died in separate “non-hostile” incidents, according to independent website www.icasualties.org. Four US soldiers also died on September 8, 2009, in two separate roadside bombs in Baghdad and central Salaheddin province. Saturday’s deaths brings to 4,435 the number of American troops to have died in Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein, according to an AFP tally based on data from icasualties.
While combat operations were officially declared over at the end of August, some 50,000 US troops remain in Iraq, primarily charged with training and advising their Iraqi counterparts, ahead of a complete withdrawal at the end of the year, per the terms of a bilateral security pact.
