|
3 U.S. Soldiers Missing, U.N. To Decide On Iraq
 |
|
A
library photo for an OH-58D Kiowa Warrior helicopter
|
BAGHDAD,
January 26 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – Two U.S. pilots
went missing late Sunday, January 25, after their rescue helicopter
crashed into northern Iraq's Tigris river, the fifth U.S. helicopter
crash in less than a month.
Six
Iraqi police officers were also killed Monday, January 26, in a
missile and gun attack on Al-Gazira police station in the western city
of Ramadi, Aljazeera satellite channel reported.
The
OH-58 Kiowa Warrior helicopter splashed down in the river near the
city of Mosul during a mission to find another U.S. soldier lost in
the waters when a patrol boat capsized, reported Agence France-Presse
(AFP).
"The
helicopter was on a search and rescue mission for a U.S. soldier
reported missing when the boat he was in capsized at approximately
5:15 pm (1415 GMT) today," a U.S. military spokesman said.
A
senior police official in Mosul, 370km north of Baghdad, said the
101st Airborne Division helicopter had crashed after flying at low
altitude into cables strung across the river.
The
cables are used for pulling un-powered vessels across the broad river,
which runs from Turkey through Syria, before traversing Iraq to the
Persian Gulf.
Hopes
were fading Monday of finding the two airmen alive, but the U.S.
military said that the search is still underway.
The
patrol boat accident also killed two Iraqi policemen and an Iraqi
interpreter.
The
spokesman said that the boat contained three other U.S. soldiers –
who were reported safe -- and members of the Iraqi police force
patrolling the waters around Mosul.
On
Friday, January 23, another OH-58 Kiowa Warrior attached to the same
airborne division went down near the northern city of Kayyarah,
killing the two crew on board.
On
January 8, a UH-60 Black Hawk aircraft was
shot down near Fallujah, west of Baghdad, killing all nine on
board.
U.N.
Mission
 |
|
Lakhdar
Brahimi is expected to lead a new U.N. team to Iraq
|
On
the diplomatic front, U.N. Secretary-General Kofi Annan is expected to
announce Monday or at the latest Tuesday, January 27, that he will
send a mission to Iraq to salvage the troubled U.S. plan of selecting
a new government by June 30, Reuters news agency quoted U.N. diplomats
as saying.
Annan,
who is on a European tour, will recommend alternatives to the
complicated U.S. plan of caucuses in a bid to break
the deadlock and satisfy the Shiites, who along with other Iraqi
powers fiercely
oppose the U.S. schemes.
The
current American
plan envisages a complicated selection process for a series of
caucuses in 18 provinces, whose delegates would then select
representatives for a national assembly by the end of May 2004. That
body would pick a provisional cabinet and head of state.
But
Annan may not give details on when the electoral team will go to
Baghdad or who will lead it, the diplomats said.
Instead,
the U.N. top diplomat probably will link the departure of the team to
a U.N. security assessment in Iraq.
The
world body ordered its staff to leave Iraq in October 2003 following
two bombings at its Baghdad headquarters, that killed
top envoy Sergio Vieira De Mello and 21 others.
The
United States wants Lakhdar Brahimi, the former Algerian foreign
minister who just finished a two-year stint as chief U.N. envoy in
Afghanistan, to lead the U.N. team in Iraq, Reuters said.
He
was called to the White House Thursday, January 22, for talks with
President Bush, Secretary of State Colin Powell and national security
adviser Condoleezza Rice.
Tens
of thousands of Shiites took
to the streets on Monday, January 19, to support Shiite
authority Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani's unrelenting call for direct
elections and rejection of U.S. Iraq overseer Paul Bremer’s plans in
the second mass rally in four days.
|
