Security Summary: January 28, 2007

A man is seen through the shattered window of a school where five girls died in a mortar attack today

NAJAF - U.S. and Iraqi forces killed 250 gunmen from a Muslim cult in a battle involving U.S. tanks and helicopters near the Shi'ite holy city of Najaf, Iraqi police, army and political sources said.

NAJAF - Two U.S. soldiers were killed when their helicopter crashed north of Najaf, the U.S. military said. A Reuters reporter saw a U.S. helicopter come down after a burst of machine gun fire during the fighting north of the city. He saw a trail of smoke from the helicopter before it came down. I

BAGHDAD - Police found 29 bodies in various parts of Baghdad, a police source said.

JURF AL-SAKHAR - A mortar strike on a residential area of the town of Jurf al-Sakhar, 85 km (53 miles) south of Baghdad, killed 10 people and wounded five, Iraqi police said.

BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier was killed on Saturday by a roadside bomb north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said.

KIRKUK - A suicide car bomb killed eight people and wounded 19 in the mainly Kurdish Almas district of Kirkuk, police and hospital officials said. A second car bomb killed eight and wounded 15 in a market frequented by Kurds, police said.

RAMADI - Tribal leaders said their security forces clashed with insurgents in central Ramadi, killing three gunmen.

RAMADI - Iraqi police manning a checkpoint in Ramadi opened fire on a suicide car bomber as it sped towards them on Friday, causing the vehicle to detonate, the U.S. military said, adding that it had caused little damage and minor injuries.

BAGHDAD - A U.S. soldier in the military police died on Saturday from wounds suffered when a roadside bomb hit his vehicle in northern Baghdad, the U.S. military said.

KIRKUK - A roadside bomb killed a man and wounded two others in Kirkuk, police said.

FALLUJA - A U.S. marine died on Saturday from wounds suffered in combat in Iraq's western province of Anbar, the U.S. military said.

ZUBAIYR - British forces found a weapons cache on Saturday that included 400 to 500 mortars as well as rockets and bomb- making equipment, a British military spokesman in Basra said. The cache was found in Zubayr, a mixed town of Sunni Arabs and Shi'ites in the mainly Shi'ite south near Basra.

NEAR KIRKUK - Police found the bullet-riddled body of a man in a town near Kirkuk, police said. The victim's body showed signs of torture.

BAGHDAD - A bomb planted in a minibus killed one person and wounded five others in Habibiya district in eastern Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - A bomb planted in a car killed two people and wounded four others near al-Nidaa Sunni mosque in Qahira district in northern Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - A bomb in a minibus killed five people, including two women a child, and wounded 35 others near a crowded market in Sadr City district in eastern Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed five people and wounded 20 in a commercial street in the southern Bayaa district of Baghdad, police said.

BAGHDAD - Five female pupils were killed in a mortar strike on a secondary school in the predominantly Sunni Adil district of western Baghdad on Sunday, the school's principal said.

BAGHDAD - Gunmen ambushed the director general of Iraq's Industry Ministry in Baghdad's western Yarmouk district as he drove to work, killing him, his daughter, and two others, police and the ministry said.

BAGHDAD - Gunmen attacked an Iraqi army patrol, killing two soldiers and wounding three on a road south of Baghdad.

RAMADI - The brother of Saad Hussein al-Alwani, a tribal leader whose body was found in Ramadi on Saturday, disputed police accounts that Alwani was a member of the Iraqi National Congress. He said his brother had no political affiliation.

From Reuters/Alternet