Iraqi Justice Minister Escapes Suicide Car Bomb

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A suicide car bomber drove into a convoy carrying Iraq's justice minister on Saturday, killing five bodyguards but leaving him unscathed, in an attack claimed by a group led by al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

A statement posted on an Islamist Web site said the attack was carried out by the military wing of Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad group, blamed by Washington for a series of deadly suicide bombings in Iraq and for executing at least three hostages.

Witnesses said the attacker drove toward the convoy close to the home of Justice Minister Malik al-Hassan and detonated his car bomb in a ball of flame.

"There was a blast alongside the convoy. A booby-trapped car came alongside and blew up," said traffic policeman Hussein Abed. The health ministry said five bodyguards were killed.

Five gutted cars were littered across the road, and Iraqis collected human remains scattered among the wreckage.

"What I want to highlight is that this is clearly a terrorist attack by people who do not want to see this country move forward," U.S. Colonel Michael Formica of the 1st Cavalry Division said at the scene.

Abdul Nasser Mohammed, one of the surviving bodyguards, pointed at one of the cars destroyed in the blast and said: "Two people were killed in this car and all we found was body parts."

"We were working as painters near the ministry house when suddenly there was an explosion," one of the injured, Khalid Waleed, said from his hospital bed. "The glass shattered everywhere, hitting us."

In another car bomb attack, two members of Iraq's National Guard were killed and around 25 wounded in a blast in the town of Mahmudiya, just south of the capital, on Saturday morning.

North of Baghdad, a roadside bomb in the town of Baiji killed a U.S. soldier and wounded another. The death brought to 655 the number of American troops killed in action in Iraq since the invasion last year to oust Saddam Hussein.

Insurgents have repeatedly targeted top officials. Earlier this week a regional governor was killed when his convoy was ambushed. In May, a suicide car bomb attack killed Izzedin Salim, the president of the country's Governing Council.

Zarqawi's group claimed responsibility for those attacks. The group has also beheaded an American and a South Korean hostage, and says it has killed one of two Bulgarians kidnapped in Iraq earlier this month.

Diplomats in Baghdad and Bulgarian officials said a headless corpse in an orange jumpsuit found in the Tigris River on Thursday was probably that of one of the Bulgarians. Hopes of finding the second Bulgarian alive were fading, they said.

"The information is unfavorable but we are still awaiting confirmation," Bulgarian Prime Minister Simeon Saxe-Coburg told reporters when asked about the fate of the second hostage.

Guerrillas in Iraq have also seized a Filipino driver and an Egyptian. The Philippines is withdrawing its small military contingent from Iraq ahead of schedule in an effort to save the life of truck driver Angelo de la Cruz.

Eleven members of the contingent, including its commander Brigadier General Jovito Palparan, arrived in Kuwait overnight on their way back to the Philippines.

In Manila, presidential spokesman Ignacio Bunye said in a newspaper column that it could take some time to secure de la Cruz's release.

"We admire Angelo for his sacrifice and courage and we all want him home but it may take time," Bunye said.

"Right now, we must not do anything that can put Angelo's life in danger," he said. "Those terrorists have killed before and they can kill again. Any wrong signal or message could make them go crazy."

Washington has criticized the pull-out and Iraq's interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi has also urged foreign countries not to give in to insurgents and hostage takers.

(Additional reporting by Luke Baker in Baghdad and Rosemarie Francisco in Manila)

Iraqi Justice Minister Malik Dohan al-Hassan gives a news conference in Baghdad, Iraq in this Wednesday, July 7, 2004 file photo. A car bomb struck the justice minister's convoy as it moved through western Baghdad on Saturday, July 17, 2004, killing five bodyguards and wounding two others. al-Hassan was not injured in the attack. (AP Photo/Hussein Malla)

An Iraqi investigator examines the site of a car bomb which was detonated on the convoy of Iraqi Justice Minister Malik Dohan al-Hassan in Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, July 17, 2004. Al-Hassan was unhurt but five bodyguards were killed.(AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

An Iraqi policeman stands next to an unexploded artillary shell set to explode with a remote control device on the convoy of Iraqi Justice Minister Malik Dohan al-Hassan in Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, July 17, 2004. Al-Hassan's convoy was attacked by a car bomb that killed 5 of his bodyguards, but not him. The shell had been set for him on an alternate route.(AP Photo/Karim Kadim)

Iraqi men and a U.S. Army soldier carry a victim from the scene after a car bomb exploded next to a convoy carrying Iraqi Justice Minister Malik al-Hassan in Baghdad July 17, 2004. The bomb killed at least four people but al-Hassan escaped unhurt, according to U.S. military officials on the scene. Photo by Reuters Iraqi men and a U.S. Army soldier carry a victim from the scene after a car bomb exploded next to a convoy carrying Iraqi Justice Minister Malik al-Hassan in Baghdad July 17, 2004. The bomb killed at least four people but al-Hassan escaped unhurt, according to U.S. military officials on the scene.

A U.S. Army soldier, from the 1st Cavalry Division, takes photos at the scene of a car bomb explosion in western Baghdad, July 17, 2004. At least four people were killed when a car bomb went off in al-Jamia district in Baghdad as a convoy of Iraqi justice minister Malik al-Hassan was driving past. The justice minister escaped and wasn't hurt, U.S. military officials said. Photo by Ali Jasim/Reuters

Iraqi National Guardsmen secure an area where 15 oil tankers were seized from smugglers near Basra, 550km south of Baghdad July 17, 2004. Earlier today, a car bomb in Mahmudiya, just south of Baghdad, killed two Iraqi National Guardsmen and wounded 25 people, the latest in a series of attacks targeting Iraq's security forces. REUTERS/Atef Hassan

A badly wounded Iraqi man is being rushed into al-Yarmouk hospital after he was hurt in a suicide car bomb explosion which struck western Baghdad July 17, 2004. A suicide car bomber blew up his vehicle as a convoy carrying Iraq's justice minister Malik al-Hassan drove past in Baghdad on Saturday, killing at least four people and injuring several others but not including the minister, police and U.S. troops at the scene said. REUTERS/Akram Saleh

Iraqi police officers survey a destroyed vehicle at the scene of a suspected car bomb explosion in the Iraqi capital Baghdad July 17, 2004. A suspected car bomb went off in Baghdad as a convoy of the Iraqi justice minister Malik al-Hassan was driving past. The justice minister escaped and wasn't hurt, eyewitnesses said. REUTERS/Akram Saleh

US soldiers inspect the site of a bomb attack targeting a convoy for the Iraqi Minister of Justice, Malek Dohan al-Hassan. The Al-Qaeda-linked militant group led by Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi claimed responsibility for a bomb attack on Iraq's justice minister, in a message posted on an Islamist website.(AFP/Karim Sahib)

American soldiers inspect a vehicle that contained a car bomb which was detonated on the convoy of Iraqi Justice Minister Malik Dohan al-Hassan in Baghdad, Iraq Saturday, July 17, 2004. Al-Hassan was unhurt but five bodyguards were killed.(AP Photo/Jim MacMillan)

Iraqi policemen rescue one of the victims of an explosion at the site of an attack targeting a convoy for the Iraqi Minister of Justice, Malek Dohan al-Hassan(AFP/Ahmed Fadaam)

A statement posted on an Islamist website purported to be from the Al-Qaeda terror network demands Italy withdraw its troops from Iraq, under threat of a series of car bomb attacks. Here Italian troops in Nasiriyah(AFP/File/Antonio Scorza)

This is the design of one of two an anti-war billboards that will be displayed over Times Square, in New York, during the Republican Convention. Project Billboard has agreed to the two billboards, a giant peace dove and this one, which is a ticker displaying the cost of the war in Iraq in dollars, the Berkeley, Calif.-based group said Thursday, July 15. That proposal replaces one that would have shown a stylized bomb and fuse decorated in stars and stripes above the message, 'Democracy is best taught by example, not by war.' San Antonio-based Clear Channel had objected to a bomb image in New York. (AP Photo/Project Billboard)

Senior Sunni cleric calls for holy war against US forces in Iraq

RAMADI, Iraq (AFP) - A senior Sunni cleric called on his followers to launch a holy war against the US forces in Iraq and threatened to turn the hotspot city of Ramadi into a "graveyard" for American troops.

"I ask US President (George W.) Bush to withdraw from Iraq or else Ramadi will become a graveyard for US soldiers," declared Sheikh Akram Ubayed Furaih at weekly prayers in the city, 100 kilometres (60 miles) west of Baghdad.

"I call upon my brothers the Shiites and on all other religious groups to embark on a Jihad (holy war) against the US military to force them out of Iraq," said the cleric, who spent three months in a prison after being arrested by the US military and whose home was also raided last week.

"I urge all the Iraqi people to fight a holy war against the Americans," said the cleric, among the most respected figures in this Sunni rebel bastion.

Using slightly more moderate tones, two other Sunni clerics from the Muslim Scholars' Association spoke out against conditions in military detention centres run by the US-led coalition.

"We have received messages from inmates at Um Qasr (detention centre on the border with Kuwait) describing their suffering during this hot weather," said Ahmed Abdel Gafur Samarrai, addressing a crowd at the Um al-Qura mosque in Baghdad.

He called on the United Nations to intervene on behalf of the detainees.

"The United Nations must do something because it granted a legitimacy to the occupation, but this legitimacy has been lost due to the actions that have taken place," said Samarrai, referring to the thousands of Iraqis locked up on suspicion of involvement in the persistent insurgency that has dogged the 14-month US-led occupation.

Among Iraq's majority Shiite community there also came condemnation of the interim Iraqi government and fresh demands for the death of jailed dictator Saddam Hussein ).

"We refuse to submit to terrorists and the occupiers are the worst of all the terrorists ... We denounce anything that is named by the occupier," said Sheikh Jaber al-Kafaji, speaking in the name of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr, in reference to the new administration.

Kafaji said he suspected the United States of wanting to release Saddam Hussein.

Washington "has started to prepare this by saying that he had no weapons of mass destruction and nothing to do with what took place in the United States," Kafaji said, referring to the terrorist attacks there on September 11, 2001.

In the holy city of Karbala, a representative of Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani launched a harsh attack against Arab lawyers who have offered to represent the ex-president.

"It sickens us to see them rushing to defend this fallen man taking the dollars of his wife (Sajida Saddam Hussein). You have to cut off his head and this is the minimum that we want," he said.

Iraq Amnesty Excludes Killers of Americans - Envoy

By Dean Yates

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A planned amnesty for Iraqi insurgents will not include those who have killed Americans, the U.S. ambassador to Baghdad said on Saturday.

"I'm not aware of any provision in the draft for amnesty for those who might have killed Americans," John Negroponte told a group of foreign reporters at a lunch.

"My understanding is that there may have been at one point some language that was ambiguous and lent itself to the interpretation that somehow amnesty would be granted to people who had sought to harm coalition forces. My understanding is that ambiguity is no longer in the draft."

The veteran diplomat took up his post on June 28 when U.S.-led occupying powers handed formal sovereignty to an interim administration led by Prime Minister Iyad Allawi.

Allawi is expected to soon announce the amnesty for insurgents. He has said this will not include murderers and kidnappers.

Allawi has said the amnesty for insurgents to lay down their weapons will only last a short time but has not said when it will be declared.

More than 650 U.S. troops have been killed since the start of the war to oust Saddam Hussein last year.

"The basic notion of amnesty, to the extent that it involves reaching out to alienated elements of this society who might be willing to come back under the political tent, has a political logic that makes sense to me," Negroponte said.

Asked what he thought of Baathists or Moqtada al-Sadr, a young Shi'ite cleric whose fighters have fought street battles with U.S. troops in some cities, being welcomed under that political tent, he said that would be an Iraqi decision.

NO TIMEFRAME ON TROOP REDUCTION

Negroponte said it was too early to say when U.S. troop numbers in Iraq of about 140,000 could be cut. That depended on the capabilities of Iraqi forces, largely being trained by the American military, he said.

He said the equipping the police and the army had speeded up after some initial glitches.

"I think it would be foolish to try to stipulate a date or time when these reductions might take place. I think the measure of when this takes place is going to be how able the Iraqis themselves are to take over their own security," he said.

Negroponte said the U.S. embassy in Baghdad -- Washington's biggest in the world -- would assist Iraq's political transition and economic rebuilding.

But he sought to play down the size of the mission, saying it was not a "mega" or "super" embassy. Asked how often he spoke to Allawi, he said a couple of times a week.

Negroponte said elections due by January to choose a transitional assembly were a high priority, and acknowledged the tough road in getting there.

"There are problems, sure there are. But I'm struck by the number of Iraqis both in the leadership and among the people who are willing to risk their lives to carry this process forward," he said.

He said there should be a higher rate of disbursement of U.S. reconstruction funds in the coming months, giving the economy a boost. He did not elaborate.

Washington has set aside $18.4 billion for rebuilding.

Zarqawi Group Attacked Iraqi Minister - Web Site

DUBAI (Reuters) - A group led by suspected al Qaeda ally Abu Musab al-Zarqawi claimed responsibility for the suicide car bomb attack on Iraq's Justice minister on Saturday, according to a statement posted on an Islamist Web site.

The statement by the military wing of Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad Group said a volunteer from its "Martyrs' Brigade" had carried out the attack on the "apostate traitor" Malik al-Hassan.

The bomber blew up his vehicle as a convoy carrying Hassan drove past in Baghdad, killing four people but not harming the minister, police and U.S. troops at the scene said.

The claim could not be immediately authenticated but it resembled earlier statements by the group on Islamist Web sites.

Zarqawi's group has claimed responsibility for several suicide bombings and other attacks on Iraqi and U.S. officials in recent months. It has also said it killed a Bulgarian, an American and a South Korean hostage in Iraq.

Insurgents have repeatedly targeted top Iraqi officials. Earlier this week a regional governor was killed when his convoy was ambushed. In May, a suicide car bomb attack killed the president of the country's Governing Council.

Killers Gouge Out Eyes of Jordanian Driver in Iraq

RAMADI, Iraq (Reuters) - Insurgents shot and killed a Jordanian truck driver in western Iraq on Saturday and then gouged out his eyes and left his body lying by the side of the road, witnesses and police said.

The driver, identified as Ayid Nassir, a Jordanian father of two, was carrying supplies from Amman to Baghdad when he was attacked outside the town of Ramadi, 65 miles west of Baghdad, at about 6 a.m. (2200 EDT Friday).

Reuters Television pictures showed at least seven bullet holes in the windshield of his yellow Mercedes truck and others in the body of the vehicle. The driver was hit at least four times, including two wounds each to his head and chest.

Pictures taken at a Ramadi hospital shortly after the attack showed that he had also had his eyes gouged out using a sharp instrument. Truck drivers traveling with Nassir's convoy said the mutilation took place after he was shot dead.

"The poor man. He was working for himself, just trying to make a living," said a policeman at the scene.

Truck drivers are regularly attacked on the desert highway from Jordan to Baghdad, which passes close to the towns of Ramadi and Falluja, violent and insecure places essentially under the control of Sunni Muslim insurgents.

U.S. forces have a presence on the outskirts of Ramadi and Falluja, but have avoided going into them since pulling back afer a month of heavy urban clashes in April and early May.

Saddam Defense Likely to Be Mix of Tactics

By JAMAL HALABY, Associated Press Writer

AMMAN, Jordan - Even fallen dictators deserve a fair trial, some of Saddam Hussein's lawyers argue. Others on the legal team say they're rallying to the cause of a symbol of Arab pride toppled by an imperial power.

That combination means the defense strategy during a trial expected to start next year is likely to be a mix of tactics, from trying to prove Saddam is not as vicious as many believe, to challenging the legitimacy of a court chosen while Iraq was under U.S. occupation.

"If we put a sufficient amount of traps in the functioning of this court, the Americans and the new Iraqi authorities might perhaps backstep," said French attorney Emmanuel Ludot, one of 21 lawyers who say they have been appointed by Saddam's wife Sajida.

Ludot said one goal is to have the U.N. propose other judges — and if that doesn't work challenge the current court at every step.

"Our job will be to work so that this tribunal doesn't function, that it be paralyzed as long as possible," Ludot told The Associated Press in Paris.

First, though, the team must persuade the Americans and the Iraqis they are Saddam's lawyers.

None are Iraqi, and Iraqi officials say an Iraqi must at least lead the team. U.S. authorities have refused to let the legal team or other lawyers see the Iraqi dictator, who was arrested in December — yanked from an underground hideaway by American forces — and is being held in a U.S.-controlled jail until Iraqis are ready to take physical custody of him.

No lawyer was at Saddam's side when he was arraigned July 1 in Baghdad on broad charges that included killing rival politicians over 30 years; gassing Kurds in Halabja in 1988; invading Kuwait in 1990; and suppressing Kurdish and Shiite uprisings in 1991.

Until defense lawyers are allowed to meet Saddam, a long-term strategy is unlikely to emerge, said Curtis Doebbler, the only American on a team that includes law professor Aicha Moammar Gadhafi, daughter of the Libyan leader, and lawyers from Belgium, Britain, France, Jordan, Lebanon and Tunisia.

Doebbler, an expert on international law, told reporters in Washington earlier this month his clients over the past decade have included Ethiopian refugees and political activists in Sudan.

"Whether it's a former president or whether it's a refugee, individuals have the same basic human rights," Doebbler said. "Even the people we dislike the most have a right to a fair trial."

Doebbler said he has asked the U.S. Supreme Court to declare the detention of the deposed Iraqi leader unconstitutional.

"Even the basic rights of due process, the basic rights of fair trial are being stomped on," Doebbler told AP in an e-mail exchange.

Issam Ghazawi, a Jordanian on the defense team, said he was defending Saddam because "in my conviction and personal view, he's innocent and all the allegations against him are false."

He also said that Saddam represents "Arab pride and dignity, and defending him is the least I can do."

The team leader, Jordanian Mohammed Rashdan, is a Saddam admirer who fought alongside Iraqis in the 1980-88 Iran-Iraq war.

Rashdan said he was collecting documents he said challenged accusations Saddam was responsible for the 1988 attack with chemical weapons on the Kurdish town of Halabja that killed at least 5,000 people.

"Tests on the chemicals used showed that it was material that the Iraqi army never possessed," he said, hinting that Iran carried out the attack. That echoed comments Saddam's regime had made about Halabja, but few others hold anyone but Saddam responsible.

"When we are in the trial, you will see the documents," Rashdan said.

Frenchman Ludot has said lawyers will look for ways to undermine the judges as part of their strategy. Rashdan has tried to link the head of the special Iraqi tribunal, Salem Chalabi, with Israel, saying he is a law partner of Mark Zell, a Washington lawyer and now a West Bank settler. Such a connection would anger many Arabs.

"Mr. Salem Chalabi can never be neutral, he can never be fair," Rashdan said. "Mr. Chalabi is a law partner with a Zionist."

There was no immediate comment from Chalabi. Zell, reached in Jerusalem, refused comment.

Another Jordanian lawyer, Ziad al-Khasawneh, said the team would attack the legitimacy of both judges "installed by the American occupation" and of the U.S.-led war that put Saddam in jail.

"It was an American-British aggression because the only justification, to rid Iraq of its weapons of mass destruction, was nonexistent, a big lie, since no such weapons were found in Iraq," al-Khasawneh said. "Therefore, Mr. President Saddam Hussein is Iraq's legitimate leader and his detention and trial are illegal."

Al-Khasawneh said the team was considering suing President Bush (news - web sites), British Prime Minister Tony Blair (news - web sites) and other American and British officials for launching an "unjustified aggression which resulted in toppling Iraq's legitimate leadership and plunging the country into chaos."

___ EDITOR'S NOTE: Associated Press writer Elaine Ganley in Paris contributed to this report.

Heavy duty : A heavily armed Iraqi national guardsman stands guard at a checkpoint on the highway joining the flashpoint towns of Ramadi and Fallujah to Baghdad in Abu Ghraib. (AFP/Ahmad al-Rubbaye)

Fallujah Savors Quietest Spell in a Year

By HAMZA HENDAWI, Associated Press Writer

FALLUJAH, Iraq - Two months after U.S. Marines pulled out, residents of Fallujah feel safe again, sleeping on their roofs to escape the heat without fear of the once-constant nighttime gunbattles, and traveling the streets without worrying they could be stopped or detained.

Fallujah, they say, is savoring its most peaceful spell in more than a year. U.S. forces camped on the city's outskirts say they want to return to help out, but no one here is interested.

"If they come back, we'll fight them and die with honor," said Mohammed Hatem, 17, as he and a cousin prowled for pigeons to shoot with an air rifle they share.

His cousin, 15-year-old Youssef Joma'a, agreed: "We are improving our aim, so if the Americans return, we too can fight."

Fallujah's estimated 300,000 residents have a reputation for being tough, conservative and having little tolerance for outside authority, least of all foreign occupiers.

The U.S. military knows that. Since Saddam Hussein's fall last year, Fallujah remained defiant as U.S. military units came and went.

The military tried getting tough with one hand and being sensitive with the other.

U.S. soldiers waged nighttime security sweeps, storming private homes in search for weapons and fighters.

They also painted schools, installed power generators and water pumps, and distributed candy and toys to children.

Nothing worked, and Fallujah turned into a daily battleground of fighting between mujahedeen, or holy warriors, and U.S. troops. With time, it earned a reputation for being the most hostile city to U.S. troops in Iraq.

Things came to a head in Fallujah soon after the March 31 killings of four U.S. contractors whose bodies were mutilated — two were hung from a bridge by an Iraqi mob. The incident led to a three-week siege of the city by the Marines during which heavy fighting took place.

The city began to see peace again when U.S. Marines lifted the siege and handed over security to a new "Fallujah Brigade" made up of local residents and commanded by officers from Saddam's former army. Many of those who fought the Marines joined the brigade.

The mujahedeen, who led that fight, now wield vast influence in the city, aided by the perception that they gave Islam a rare victory over a superpower.

From an American perspective, the "Fallujah Brigade" experiment — billed at the time as "an Iraqi solution to an Iraqi problem" — has been a disaster. The U.S. military now says Fallujah is a den of terrorists and a refuge for foreign Muslim fighters waging global jihad against America.

"We'd like to have access to Fallujah to get many planned, high impact economic and quality of life projects underway," said Lt. Col. T.V. Johnson, a Marines spokesman in the Fallujah area. "The security conditions required for that type of work do not exist in the city."

Yet fears that once the Marines left, the local militants would impose a strict interpretation of Islam proved exaggerated. Also proven unfounded were expectations that the mujahedeen would target U.S.-appointed officials — like the mayor and police chief — and kill Iraqis thought to have cooperated with the Americans. Instead, residents say the city is doing just fine.

The streets are patrolled by police and Fallujah Brigade members. Fighters wearing ammunition belts and armed with assault rifles help direct traffic. Charities have sprung up to help families of those killed during the fighting.

For the first time in months, a Friday sermon in a Fallujah mosque made no mention of the Americans, concentrating instead on a religious message: death comes when least expected, so every Muslim must be ready by performing all his religious duties.

In an implicit barb at the unelected government of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi, Sheik Fawzi al-Obeidi ended his sermon at the Hamoud al-Mahmoud mosque with an unusual prayer "May God take away the Iraqis' lust for power and authority."

After the Americans left, "no one ordered me to grow a beard or tried to fight the growth of civil society in Fallujah," said Maki al-Nazzal of the city's Scientific and Cultural Forum, a non-governmental agency that promotes education and political and social awareness.

Speaking in a community center over the battle screams of children taking a kung fu class next door and the distant sound of an American jet flying over the city, al-Nazzal denied U.S. claims that Fallujah has become a center of terrorism.

Drawing on his experience during the fighting in April as a volunteer hospital manager, he said: "All I know is that our American liberators were sniping at civilians and the so-called terrorists were bringing them to the hospital to be treated and were donating blood."

Nazzal and others in Fallujah say they cannot rule out the presence of a small number of foreign Muslim fighters in the city, but are adamant that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, a Jordanian suspected of masterminding bombings in Iraq, was not here.

The U.S. military has launched repeated airstrikes on suspected al-Zarqawi safehouses here.

"If you're a Muslim who cares about the faith, you'll come and fight the foreign occupier of a Muslim land," said Ismail Khalil, a Sunni cleric. "It's all the land of Islam, be it Syria, Egypt or Iraq. But the people who defended Fallujah are the city's own sons."

However, residents have recently taken to warning visitors against "criminal" kidnappers.

Fresh graffiti belonging to a shadowy group, The Islamic Response — 1920 Revolution Brigades, which said it had kidnapped U.S. Marine Cpl. Wassef Ali Hassoun in Fallujah and later freed him, could be seen Thursday at the city center. It was painted over on Friday.

American's Decapitation Shown on Internet

CAIRO, Egypt - Images of an American hostage being decapitated surfaced Saturday on an Internet site known for carrying the statements of Islamic militants.

The gruesome videotape appeared three days after U.S. authorities announced the search for the body of Paul M. Johnson Jr. had been called off.

Still photographs of Johnson's beheading had been posted June 19 on some of the same militant Islamic forums that on Saturday provided links to the newly released video footage.

Johnson, a 49-year-old engineer for U.S. defense contractor Lockheed Martin, was kidnapped June 12.

The video, which ran almost two minutes and included images of tanks and destroyed homes apparently in Iraq, carried the title "The Voice of Jihad: Get the infidels out of the Arabian Peninsula."

Voice of Jihad is the name of a periodical issued on the Internet twice monthly by the al-Qaida cell in Saudi Arabia, which claimed Johnson's killing.

A man, his head wrapped in a red and white checkered headscarf and his face not visible, is seen using a knife to decapitate Johnson, who was lying face down on a mattress.

The man held up Johnson's head for the camera then placed it on the body. One of the killers wiped blood off the knife on the orange jumpsuit Johnson was wearing.

Hours after the still photographs were released last month, Saudi security forces shot dead Abdul Aziz al-Moqrin, the leader of the al-Qaida cell in the kingdom.

On Wednesday, U.S. ambassador to Saudi Arabia, James C. Oberwetter, released a statement saying the FBI's search for Johnson's remains was near completion without the body being recovered.

FBI experts sent to the kingdom to help with the search began leaving and, a day later, the U.S. State Department confirmed the search had ended.

Johnson's son in Florida, Paul Johnson III, 28, was pressing U.S. officials to do more to find his father's body.

Since May last year, Saudi Arabia has suffered a series of terrorist attacks, including suicide bombings, gunbattles and kidnappings.

Many attacks have targeted foreign workers in an attempt to undermine the economy, which depends heavily on expatriate labor. Al-Qaida, led by Saudi dissident Osama bin Laden, aspires to topple the Saudi royal family and replace it with an Islamic government.

Iraq PM denies shooting inmates

WITNESSES have reportedly told an Australian journalist how new Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi shot and killed up to six prisoners just days before his government took control of the country.

A newspaper report today said the two witnesses saw Dr Allawi pull a pistol and execute suspected insurgents at a Baghdad police station.

Dr Allawi's office has denied the claims and branded them "outrageous".

The witnesses said the handcuffed and blindfolded prisoners were lined up against a wall in a courtyard next to the maximum-security cell block in which they were held at the Al-Amariyah security centre.

They say Dr Allawi told bystanders the victims had each killed as many as 50 Iraqis and they "deserved worse than death".

The prime minister's office said Dr Allawi had never visited the centre and he did not carry a gun.

One witness told the Sydney Morning Herald's Iraq correspondent Paul McGeough that before the killings Dr Allawi had told those around him that he wanted to send a clear message to the police on how to deal with insurgents.

"Allawi said that (the prisoners) deserved worse than death but then he pulled the pistol from his belt and started shooting them, " the witness said.

The informants said he shot each young man in the head as about a dozen Iraqi policemen and four Americans from the prime minister's personal security team watched.

The witnesses said seven prisoners were present, but one was only wounded.

The Herald said it was the first time eyewitness accounts of the prime minister's brutality had been obtained.

The witnesses, who were not paid for their information, estimated the shooting to have happened about the third weekend in June.

They were enthusiastic about such killings, with one of them saying: "These criminals were terrorists. They are the ones who plant the bombs."

They said the 58-year-old prime minister "wanted to send a message to his policemen and soldiers not to be scared if they kill anyone especially, they are not to worry about tribal revenge".

The Herald said two of men killed, Ahmed Abdulah Ahsamey and Amer Lutfi Mohammed Ahmed al-Kutsia, may have been foreign fighters.

A third, Walid Mehdi Ahmed al-Samarrai, may have been from Samarra, where insurgents raided the home of Interior minister Falah al-Naqib, killing four of his bodyguards on June 19.

Four of the men were described as "Wahabbi", the term for the foreign fundamentalist insurgency fighters.

Dr Allawi's office dismissed the allegations as rumours spread by the government's enemies.

"We face these sorts of allegations on a regular basis," office spokesman Taha Hussein reportedly said.

"Numerous groups are attempting to hinder what the interim Iraqi government is on the verge of achieving, and occasionally they spread outrageous accusations hoping they will be believed and thus harm the honourable reputation of those who sacrifice so much to protect this glorious country and its now free and respectable people."

A senior adviser to Mr al-Naqib, Sabah Khadum, whose portfolio covers police matters, also dismissed the accounts.

The Herald said US officials in Iraq did not deny allegations outright, but said "this case is closed".

Suicide bombs kill six in Iraq, minister survives blast

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Two suicide car bombs in Iraq killed six people and injured 36, but Iraq's 83-year-old justice minister, target of one of the blasts, escaped injury.

Also Saturday, a US soldier was killed and another injured by a roadside blast, and a second street bomb injured three policemen and five people were wounded in an attack on a police station.

In Iraq's serial hostage drama, there was fresh hope for an Egyptian whose abductors telephoned his Saudi employer to say he would be released on Sunday, but there was no word on the fate of a Filipino and a Bulgarian, both threatened with beheading.

The car bomb that targeted Justice Minister Malek Dohan al-Hasan's motorcade was claimed by al-Qaeda-linked militant Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.

Hasan emerged from the attack unscathed, three of his bodyguards, including a nephew, were killed along with two civilians, officials said.

Eight people were also wounded in the blast which hit Hassan's motorcade as it was taking him to work from his home in the west of the capital.

"My father is fine and in good health and he went straight to his office at the ministry after the attack," his son, Haidar Dohan al-Hassan, a 37-year-old businessman, told AFP by telephone.

A driver in a white Toyota approached the minister's convoy and blew himself up, said interior ministry spokesman Colonel Adnan Abdul Rahman.

Three policemen were wounded less than an hour later when a bomb planted on the side of the road exploded close to their vehicle.

Hassan, a seasoned lawyer and politician, assumed a high profile earlier this month with the unveiling of a new national security law giving the government emergency powers in its battle against the 15-month-old insurgency.

He is also one of the key players in the process of trying deposed dictator Saddam Hussein and 11 of his lieutenants, after their first appearance in the dock on July 1.

Zarqawi's Tawhid wa al-Jihad (Unification and Holy War) group claimed the attack in a message posted on an Islamist website, although its authenticity could not be immediately verified.

In another blow to Iraq's nascent security forces, a car bomb exploded outside a National Guard base in the restive town of Mahmudiya, 30 kilometres (20 miles) south of Baghdad, killing an Iraqi civilian and injuring 25, hospital and interior ministry sources said.

"An Oldsmobile vehicle sped towards the entrance of the building and when its driver failed to stop as instructed, he was fired on and the car exploded about 25 metres (yards) from the entrance," said guardsman Adel Taha.

The interior ministry confirmed the attack was a suicide bombing.

The violence came on the anniversary of the 1968 coup that brought Saddam Hussein's Baath party to power and was an important national holiday under the old regime. It also followed a rash of deadly car bombs earlier in the week.

Prime Minister Iyad Allawi is under mounting pressure to restore stability to the country since the US-led occupation ended almost three weeks ago and US ambassador to Iraq, John Negroponte named security as a top priority for his embassy, America's biggest in the world, as it adopts a support role for the new administration.

"My vision of the mission of our embassy here in Baghdad is to support and assist the government and the people of Iraq," Negroponte told reporters.

Underscoring the challenges ahead, a US soldier was killed and another wounded when their convoy was targeted in a roadside bombing near the northern Iraqi city of Beiji, the military said.

That brought to 656 the number of US troops killed in action in Iraq since the start of the US-led war in March 2003, according to US Defence Department figures.

Also in northern Iraq, two policemen, two civilians and an insurgent were injured in an attack on a police station in the village of Hawija, 50 kilometres (30 miles) west of the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, said a police official.

In Baghdad, a Sunni Muslim cleric belonging to the Iraqi Islamic Party was gunned down by unidentified assailants, a party official said.

Meanwhile, the Saudi employer of an Egyptian hostage being held in Iraq said he would be released on Sunday, citing a telephone call from the kidnappers.

But there was still no word on the fate of a Philippine hostage despite Manila's concession to his captors' demand for the early withdrawal of its 51-strong troop and police contingent from Iraq.

And the whereabouts of a Bulgarian captive also remained a mystery after his companion was beheaded earlier in the week.

In Britain, almost six out of 10 Britons would not trust Prime Minister Tony Blair to lead the country into another war following intelligence failures over Iraq's weapons of mass destruction, according to a poll published in the Sunday Times newspaper

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