Baghdad — Guerrilla strikes against United States interests in Iraq have continued to escalate in recent days, with economic sabotage on the rise and a new type of combatant — a 12-year-old-girl — entering the fray against the American army.
The girl, whose name was not released, reportedly opened fire on patrolling U.S. soldiers in her hometown of Ramadi, west of Baghdad, on Sunday. No one was injured, but the shooting highlighted that even as international leaders were meeting at a Dead Sea resort to discuss the country's political way forward, the security situation on the ground remains unpredictable at best.
In the early hours of yesterday morning, a key oil pipeline near the Syrian border was reportedly set ablaze, marking the third such attack in 10 days. There was also another grenade attack yesterday on U.S. soldiers patrolling the streets of Baghdad.
Soldiers involved in the Ramadi incident reported coming under small-arms fire that missed its target and harmlessly hit the dirt around their patrol vehicles. The troops spotted a young girl fleeing the scene with an AK-47 assault rifle and followed her home, where they found the weapon in a corner, wrapped in a red dress.
"It's just weird. It's totally unconventional," Captain Burris Wollsieffer of the Third Armored Cavalry Regiment said of the rising number of attacks. "It's guerrilla warfare."
The tense situation was further complicated by a U.S. admission that American forces had engaged in a gun battle last week with Syrian border guards, threatening to draw Iraq's neighbour into the conflict. Defence Department officials in Washington said several Syrian border guards were wounded when U.S. Special Forces attacked a convoy of suspected high-profile members of Saddam Hussein's toppled government.
A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity, said the attack occurred last Wednesday in a "fairly remote" area near Iraq's western city of Qaim close to the Syrian border and that "some Syrian guards were injured."
U.S. officials did not say whether American forces, acting on intelligence and backed by aircraft, crossed into Syria and were vague on how Syrian guards were involved. The convoy was apparently attempting to escape into Syria, the officials said.
In Baghdad yesterday, foreign journalists watching a rehearsal of Iraq's national orchestra said three U.S. soldiers standing guard across the street were injured when a grenade was lobbed at them.
"Get me out of here," said one female U.S. soldier stationed in central Baghdad when told about the latest grenade attack. "This place is too dangerous."
In an apparent effort to keep the unrest from growing any wider, the head of Iraq's new U.S.-installed administration, Paul Bremer, said yesterday that former soldiers in the disbanded Iraqi army would soon begin receiving monthly compensation payments of between $50 and $150 (U.S.).
Mr. Bremer's administration put about 400,000 people out of work with a stroke of the pen last month when he declared the old army defunct. Some of the ex-soldiers had warned of violence unless they started receiving paycheques soon, and two were shot dead by American soldiers last week when a rally to press that demand turned violent.
An aide to Mr. Bremer, Walter Slocomb, told a press conference that the "grotesquely" oversized old army would be replaced over the next few years by a force roughly one-tenth the size.
By the end of the day yesterday, even political allies of the United States, such as the Pentagon-friendly Iraqi National Congress, were calling for U.S. troops to leave Iraq's cities.
In an interview, INC spokesman Entifadh Qanbar said the move would not only ease tension, it would make life safer for American soldiers.
"Right now, U.S. soldiers inside Iraqi cities are like sitting ducks for terrorists," he said.
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