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BAGHDAD — Two kidnapping victims, an 11- and 23-year-old, were reunited with their families Jan. 7 in Baghdad after Iraqi Counter-Terrorism Forces rescued them and arrested 12 suspected criminals involved in running a kidnapping ring. The 11-year old boy was taken Dec. 25 in front of his home while playing with a friend. The 23-year-old adult was kidnapped at gun point Dec. 20 while traveling in the city. The victims are not related. The ICTF, a battalion from the Iraqi Special Operations Forces, learned of the child’s disappearance when the distraught father phoned, pleading for help. ICTF developed a plan...

CAMP TAJI, Iraq – Multi-National Division – Baghdad soldiers rescued a kidnapped Iraqi citizen May 8 near Ibrahim Bin Ali, northwest of Baghdad. Soldiers from the 1st Battalion, 21st Infantry Regiment “Gimlets,” 2nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team “Warrior,” 25th Infantry Division, acted on tips from Iraqi Army soldiers from the 3rd Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 1st Iraqi Army Division, in addition to tips provided by Iraqi Police and Sons of Iraq (Abna al-Iraq) members. The suspected kidnappers were detained and are being held for further questioning. “U.S. soldiers, in full partnership with Iraqi Security Forces, are aggressively pursuing criminals and terrorists,...

Missing Elderly Woman Found Alive in Oregon Mountains Friday, September 07, 2007  BAKER CITY, Ore.  —  A 76-year-old woman missing for almost two weeks in the Wallowa Mountains of Eastern Oregon has been found alive, the Baker County Sheriff's Office said Thursday.Ora Doris Anderson of Sandy had a hip injury and was dehydrated when she was found just after 2 p.m. But she was conscious and alert, the sheriff's office said in a news release. A helicopter team went to extricate her from the rugged terrain, and she was airlifted to a Baker City hospital.George Winn, the CEO of...

BERLIN - Germany's national railway wasn't about to risk sending a trainload of soccer fans to a German Cup match without beer. Federal police said Monday that the beer tap failed aboard a special train carrying Bayer Leverkusen fans to Hamburg on Saturday. The fault was discovered half an hour into the journey. "In order not to endanger the good mood" of the passengers, railway officials halted the train in Wuppertal for 25 minutes and had a replacement part delivered by taxi, a police statement said. It added that there was no trouble among the fans. Their team was less...

JERUSALEM - An 8-year-old Israeli boy spent six hours floating in the Dead Sea alone at night after his father left him there by accident during a family trip, police said Sunday. They said they would not press charges against the errant parent. The Dead Sea, the lowest point on earth and one of Israel’s most popular tourist attractions, has an abnormally high salt concentration that allows swimmers to float on the surface.

BAQUBAH — Coalition forces rescued seven kidnapped victims during a three-day operation in Chibernat, a village north of Baqubah, Wednesday. Coalition forces also discovered more than 10 caches, nine improvised explosive devices and detained 11 suspected insurgents throughout the course of the operation. The caches consisted of rocket-propelled grenade munitions, small-arms weapon systems, approximately 200 loaded AK-47 magazines, IED-making materials, grenades, mortar rounds and a suicide vest. Iraqi Soldiers from 4th Battalion, 2nd Brigade, 5th Iraqi Army Division and U,S Soldiers from 5th Battalion, 20th Infantry Regiment, attached to 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 1st Cavalry Division, conducted the target-driven operation...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 28, 2006 – Afghan and coalition forces discovered and disabled multiple explosive devices in three separate locations today, and coalition forces helped save two Afghan boys, U.S. military officials reported. A coalition unit discovered a landmine placed on the side of a road in Paktika province. A coalition explosive ordnance disposal team destroyed the mine in place. In Khost province, an Afghan civilian reported a makeshift bomb to the Afghan National Police, who investigated and found it in the Warza Village. Another makeshift bomb placed along the same road hit a separate Afghan police unit responding to the...

WASHINGTON, Aug. 20, 2006 – Iraqi army forces captured three death squad leaders during raids in Baghdad Aug. 18. The captured leaders allegedly participated in a massacre of Iraqi families last month, U.S. military officials reported. Coalition advisers provided support during the raids, and all three suspects were captured without incident. The men allegedly participated in a July 9 ambush of Iraqi families at a checkpoint in the al Jihad area, officials said. One of the captured leaders is a senior-level insurgent believed to be the overall organizer of the massacre. Another is a senior-level insurgent leader whose cell allegedly...

NEW YORK - Jaap Penraat, an architect and industrial designer who helped 406 Jews sneak out of Nazi-occupied Netherlands and withstood torture to protect fellow members of the resistance, has died. He was 88. Penraat died June 25 at his home in Catskill, N.Y., of esophageal cancer, said his daughter, Noelle Penraat. Penraat was in his 20s when he began forging identity cards for Jews. He was arrested, imprisoned for several months and tortured, but refused to tell his captors anything. After his release from prison, Penraat and other resistance members disguised Jews as construction workers hired to work on...

Boys trapped by Mugabe mob are rescued By Mike Pflanz, East Africa Correspondent (Filed: 08/06/2006) Zimbabwean police yesterday rescued a six-year-old British boy held hostage at a friend's farm for almost 24 hours by drum-beating supporters of President Robert Mugabe. As the mob pounded on doors and windows, James Mackenzie and his friend Ross Grinham, also six, were barricaded into a room behind several locked internal gates by Ross's mother, Chantelle Grinham. The mob, members of Mr Mugabe's Zanu-PF party, kept up the drum-beating and chants for the farm's owners to leave throughout the night and all yesterday morning. Police...

TIKRIT, Iraq, April 27, 2006 – An Iraqi civilian kidnapped in Samarra was rescued today when soldiers from 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, stopped the would-be kidnappers' vehicles and released the citizen. Units stationed in Samarra had already been aware of a "be on the lookout" report for a silver sedan suspected of being involved in a kidnapping when alert soldiers noticed a pair of silver sedans along a major thoroughfare in southern Salah ah Din province. The two automobiles were parked next to each other as observers noticed the occupants passing what appeared to be a rifle...

NEW YORK - Molly the cat is finally free. After two weeks stuck behind a brick wall in a 19th century Greenwich Village building, workers rescued the bashful 11-month-old feline from her plight late Friday, according to Jean Tannenbaum, a spokeswoman for Animal Care & Control of New York City. Representatives of Animal Care & Control, a private organization with a city contract to handle lost, injured and unwanted animals, have worked alongside a team of rescuers to drill and hammer out bricks in the cellar of the 157-year-old building to get Molly out. They used special cameras, set out...

WASHINGTON, March 28, 2006 – In the past three days, U.S. soldiers and coalition forces have detained insurgents, seized a weapons cache and rescued hostages in Iraq, military officials said. Soldiers from 3rd Brigade Combat Team, 101st Airborne Division, detained six insurgents in a raid near Samarra yesterday. The detainees were held for further questioning. The raid also uncovered a weapons cache including AK-47 assault rifles, a rocket-propelled-grenade launcher, a machine gun, machetes, bayonets, and a mortar sight. The cache was taken to a secure location for disposal. While conducting operations near Tarmiya on March 25, coalition forces rescued two...

Briton Thanks Soldiers Who Rescued HimBy THOMAS WAGNER, Associated Press Writer 1 hour, 21 minutes ago Norman Kember the freed British Christian peace campaigner smiles as he reads a statement after arriving at London's Heathrow airport Saturday March 25, 2006. Kember on Saturday thanked the soldiers who rescued him from kidnappers in Iraq, in a statement made shortly after flying into London. (AP Photo/Luke MacGregor, Pool) LONDON - Freed British hostage Norman Kember returned home Saturday after four months in captivity in Iraq and thanked the soldiers who saved him and two other peace activists. Kember, 74, arrived on a...

Coalition forces (led by British forces) rescued three Christian "peace" activists who were grabbed up by radical Islamists in Iraq last year. There was happiness and hugs from their supporters, but there is no indication if the military personnel were thanked for the rescue efforts. This story is important on several levels, the least of which is the rescue of these supposed peace activists. In fact, this story makes the points these foolish people went to Iraq to protest absurd in light of all that happened. For one thing, these people are protesting the Iraqis held in detention by coalition...

WASHINGTON, Jan. 9, 2006 – Iraqi police pre-empted two suicide bombers today, a French hostage was rescued over the weekend, and an Iraqi citizen led soldiers to a weapons cache yesterday, military officials in Baghdad reported. Two suicide bombers blew themselves up at noon today when they were denied access at an Iraqi police entry point to the Ministry of Defense compound, where an Iraqi Police Day ceremony was being held in the Rusafa District of eastern Baghdad, officials said. When Iraqi police denied the first suicide bomber entry into the compound, the terrorist detonated himself. A minute later, the...

WASHINGTON, Oct. 12, 2005 – Two 1st Corps Support Command soldiers were killed and another was injured today when their vehicle rolled over while conducting a combat logistics patrol near Balad, Iraq, military officials reported. Officials also announced that two soldiers assigned to the 2nd Brigade Combat Team, 2nd Marine Division, 2nd Marine Expeditionary Force (Forward) died of wounds suffered Oct. 10 when a roadside bomb hit their vehicle in Ramadi, Iraq. Several Army units are serving with the 2nd MEF in Iraq. The soldiers' names of the soldiers are being withheld pending notification of next of kin. In other...

Nearly 5,000 plucked from rooftops The Coast Guard has released numbers which partially explain why the death toll in New Orleans from Hurricane Katrina has been lower than expected. The Coast Guard says that during its first week of operations in New Orleans, it saved the lives of nearly 6,500 people. Officials say almost 5,000 of those rescues were by hoist in areas where the water was just too deep or dangerous for the Coast Guard to come in by boat. All of those lives were saved by the crews of just 17 helicopters, during 1,500 flight hours in the...

KABUL, Afghanistan, July 3 - One member of a four-man Navy Seal reconnaissance team has been rescued after his group were reported missing in a mountainous region of eastern Afghanistan last week, a senior Defense Department official said today.

CANBERRA, Australia - An Australian engineer from California who was dramatically rescued in Baghdad last week after being held hostage for six weeks would have been released without military intervention, Australia's most senior Muslim cleric insisted Sunday. Iraqi and U.S. troops freed Douglas Wood, a 64-year-old resident of Alamo, California, early on July 15 from a Baghdad house where insurgents were holding him for ransom. Sheik Taj El Din al-Hilaly, an Egyptian-born Sunni cleric who flew from his Sydney home within days of the April 30 abduction to negotiate a release, said Wood was to have been released the day...