US Troops Seize Arab Fighters' Baghdad Stronghold (Mansur district, Information/Foreign ministries)

Reuters | April 12, 2003

[HAL9000]

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. soldiers with tanks secured a key section of the Iraqi capital on Saturday, seizing a last known stronghold in central Baghdad of foreign fighters loyal to Saddam Hussein.

Reuters correspondent Khaled Yacoub Oweis accompanied the U.S. troops across a bridge over the Tigris river into the once top security district containing the Information and Foreign ministries on the west bank.

U.S. army Staff Sergeant David Richards said there had been considerable resistance from remnants of paramilitary forces and foreign volunteers from across the Arab world in the past three days, but opposition petered out on Saturday morning.

U.S. forces took control of the stronghold in the Mansur district near the sprawling Zawra gardens. While tanks took up positions near the gardens, looters could be seen ransacking the ministry buildings, making off with office furniture and computers.

The plunder was an echo of similar scenes across the Iraqi capital since U.S.-led forces took control of Baghdad city center on Wednesday.

Gangs of youths had blocked streets in the area using sewage pipes and many people could be seen scavenging for food.

[EternalVigilance]

Good. I hope the backhoes are busy digging in a certain bomb crater, backed up by forensic scientists with cotton swabs. I'm sure they are.

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[goldstategop]

The regime's dead enders are slowly but surely being crushed. Soon it will be all over in Baghdad.

[B4Ranch]

I'm of the thought that anyone who was wealthy or upper middle class was working with Saddam and his bunch. I don't think that Saddam would have allowed wealth to come to anyone who wasn't on his side.

[bucephalus]

I hope and have hoped that we show mercy to Iraqis trapped under an utterly repressive regime. These foreign born scabs, however, deserve no quarter. I curse them and hope that there thirst for annihilation is thoroughly satiated.