European Stars and Stripes (Newspaper) - March 17, 2007, Darmstadt, Hesse                                Saturday March 172007 stars and stripes Page 7 Roadside bomb kills 4 us soldiers in Iraq by Sinan Salaheddin the associated press Baghdad a Roadside bomb exploded thursday in Eastern Baghdad killing four us soldiers and wounding two oth ers the us military said the attack began when one bomb went off As a us unit was returning from a search operation in the mostly shiite area the military said moments later a second bomb exploded killing and wounding the soldiers a demolition team that searched the site after the attack found an explosively formed projectile a Type of High tech bomb which the us military believes comes from Iran the device was detonated by the team earlier thursday in Baghdad a suicide car bomber apparently targeting a senior City official struck an iraqi military Check Point in a shiite neighbourhood killing at least eight people officials said another bomber slammed his expo Sive packed car into an army checkpoint in a volatile sunni District in Western Bagh dad killing two people and wounding two the Baghdad blasts came a Day after the us military said stopping car bombings had become the main focus of a major Secu Rity sweep to halt the sectarian violence in the capital Sarradah a major commercial District has been hit by bombings several times in recent months including a suicide car bombings on Jan 25 that killed 30 peo ple in the City of Iskandar Yah 30 Miles South of Baghdad a bomb in a parked car exploded As a bus packed with workers passed by killing at least four and wound ing 24 police said a us Soldier was killed wednesday in fighting in Anbar province a sunni insurgent stronghold West of Baghdad the Mili tary said a Marine assigned to Multi National Force West also died the same Day in Anbar in a noncombat related incident mat is under investigation the military said separately Samir an iraqi Soldier secures the area of Kahramanan Square after a car bombing in Central Baghdad on thursday a suicide car bomber apparently targeted a Convoy carrying the head of the City Council Sabir ams Sawi at least eight people were killed Dod attacks on troops peaked in feb by Jeff Schogol and Lisa Burgess stars and stripes Arlington Vaas of Early february average weekly attacks against us and coalition troops reached their highest lev Els the most recent defense department report on Progress in Iraq says the defense department re leased the quarterly report wednesday afternoon for the first time defense officials did not Brief reporters on the quarterly report asked about the Lack of a Brief ing a defense official Down played the reports significance saying the data in the report pre dates the new Iraq strategy even though some data in the report is from february so the correlation Between our efforts now and that data is probably not of great value the official said the report says attacks against coalition and iraqi forces from october to december 2006 were the highest for any three month period since 2003 from Jan 1 to feb 9 2007 weekly attacks against us and coalition forces reached 756 up from 608 from May 20 to dec 31 2006 the report says average daily casualties for us and other coalition forces remained steady at 22 during the same time periods the report says As for the Security situation As a whole the report says that the term civil War does not fully de scribe the turmoil in Iraq but ele ments of a civil War do exist in Iraq including hardening of Ethan sectarian identities and mobilization the changing character of the violence and population displacements also in the report As of feb 19 2007 about 328700 iraqi Security forces had been trained however the Day today num Ber of iraqis in uniform is consid Erable lower the actual number of soldiers present for duty is Actu ally on half to two thirds of the total due to scheduled leave absence without leave and Attri Tion the report said As of february 2007 there were 112 iraqi army combat battalions with 103 of those conduct ing operations at varying Levels of capability and 93 in the Lead during counterinsurgency operations another 27 National police battalions Are operational with six in the Lead although what constitutes in the Lead was not defined in the report the report said that Iraq civil Security Force of 188300 which include the National police iraqi police service and the Border police and Are under control of Iraq ministry of the Inte rior is now being expanded in size to 194800 about 20 percent of the civil Security Force is lost to attrition every year the report said 100 percent of All authorized vehicle weapons and other equipment have been delivered to iraqi police in Bagh dad and nine other key cities Overall the iraqi police service has received about 83 percent of its authorized critical equipment with 100 percent of its allotment this summer however due to the ministry of interiors immature equip ment accountability system there Are no reliable figures for How much of this equipment re Mains in service the ministry also lacks a personnel accountability system and thus it is unknown How Many of the More than 306000 employees on the ministry payroll Are present for duty on a Given Day the report said coalition officials believe that less than 70 percent of those employees Are on present for duty at any Given time the us trainers both military and civilian who make up police transition teams or ptts Are working to help iraqi ministry of Interior and the police with their inventory and personnel systems according to the report email Lisa Burgess at email Jeff Schogol at total attacks by province nov 11 2006 feb 9 2007 these four provinces have approximately 37 percent of the population but account for 80 percent of attacks population weighted map average weekly attacks 1200 1000 800 600 400 200 april 1 2004 feb 9 2007 attacks targeting iraqi civilians attacks targeting iraqi Security forces d attacks targeting coalition forces of v f j f f j 3 a to of St pcs i 9 if of s is a a in 0 y source Munci stars and stripes source Munci stars and stripes vet accused of smuggling ak47s used in Bank heists by Ruben Castaneda the Washington Post Washington a Soldier who served near Baghdad has been charged with Selling High powered assault weapons he is alleged to have smuggled out of Iraq firearms that investigators think were used in a series of com Mand style Bank robberies in the Washington area authorities said Leonard s Lockley 26 of Bowie my was arrested tuesday on charges of receiving possess ing and Selling machine guns that Maryland us attorney Rod Rosenstein said he secretly took out of Iraq when he was deployed there the criminal complaint against Lockley was filed monday and unsealed wednesday investigators think the four As Sault weapons Lockley is charged with Selling were used by a gang of robbers at six Banks in the District of Columbia and suburban Maryland in 2004 the six crimes carried out with precise timing netted about two people Are serving prison sentences in connection with the offences according to a sworn affidavit by Katherine Benedict an agent with the Bureau of alcohol Tobac co firearms and explosives lock Ley was deployed near Baghdad in october 2003 at that time the affidavit states a witness saw Lockley putting the components of four ak47style rifles into a Large Black Metal Chest containing a false Bottom Lockley told the wit Ness he was using the Chest to Send the weapons Back to the United states the document states Lockley returned to the United states in february 2004 the next month he met with one of the Bank robbers in Hyattsville and agreed to sell him the weapons for each prosecutors said