BAGHDAD, Iraq – Villagers found three decapitated bodies north of Baghdad Wednesday, and a car bomb killed two people at an Iraqi military checkpoint south of the capital in attacks that appear to be increasingly targeting Iraqis rather than the United States and its multinational force allies.
The bodies were found in nylon bags, the heads in bags alongside them, near Dijiel, about 25 miles north of Baghdad, said Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman of the Interior Ministry. They were all men with tattoos, including one with the letter ‘H’ on his arm, but no documents were found on them, he said.
A U.S. military official said the bodies appeared to be Iraqis and had their hands tied behind their backs.
While insurgents have often beheaded foreign hostages in their fight against the government and coalition forces, it is not a tactic usually used against Iraqis, who are more often abducted for money.
Residents from a nearby village found the bodies shortly after dawn and notified the Iraqi national guard, said Iraqi Lt. Ahmad Farouk.
A photographer saw the three corpses lined up with their heads by their sides on the floor at the guard compound before U.S. troops collected them and handed them over to police. Two wore jeans and shirts and the third wore sweat pants and a T-shirt. All appeared young.
Meanwhile, militants released a Turkish man identified as Aytulla Gezmen, an Arabic language translator who was taken hostage in late July, according to a videotape. The Turkish Foreign Ministry confirmed he had been freed.
A group calling itself The Shura Council of the Mujahedeen said in a separate video Tuesday that it was freeing Gezmen after he converted to Islam and repented working for the Americans.
In other developments.
* U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan told the British Broadcasting Corp. that the American-led attack on Iraq, conducted without U.N. approval, was in contravention of the U.N. charter. “From our point of view and the (U.N.) charter point of view it was illegal,” Annan said.
* The U.S. military released 275 detainees from the Abu Ghraib prison, the facility near Baghdad where U.S. soldiers allegedly abused Iraqi detainees, authorities said. Another 2,500 remain in custody there.
* In Brussels, Belgium, NATO envoys neared agreement on a limited expansion of the alliance’s training mission for the Iraqi military after the United States and France narrowed differences over the scale and command of the operation. Up to 300 NATO instructors could be deployed in Iraq, supplementing the larger U.S. operation to rebuild a 260,000-strong Iraqi military force, diplomats said. A deal on setting up the training center for Iraqi officers is expected by early next week.
Associated Press
Najia Hamad watches as her son Jeslam receives medical aid Wednesday in Ramadi, Iraq. Jeslam was hit by shrapnel during clashes between armed insurgents and U.S. soldiers. Five people were reported killed in the fighting.
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