Associated Press
 

April 2, 2003 Wednesday

HEADLINE: Iraqi Forces Shell Kurdish Town

BYLINE: BORZOU DARAGAHI; Associated Press Writer

DATELINE: KIFREY, Iraq

BODY:
Iraqi forces shelled this village in the Kurdish autonomous region of northern Iraq on Wednesday, and fighter jets of the U.S.-led coalition targeted Iraqi positions 100 miles north of Baghdad.

Iraqi mortar and missile attacks a day earlier killed three civilians and wounded a dozen others in Kifrey, a village of 27,000 on the front line between Iraqi and Kurdish forces. Several Kurdish fighters were among the wounded.

Although the Iraqis have lobbed shells at front line Kurdish villages, this was the first known concentrated artillery assault on the Kurds.

Three-quarters of Kifrey's residents fled and artillery fire continued Wednesday, aimed mostly at a Kurdish bunker in the nearby village of Karez .

Kurdish military commander Mola Bakhtiyar said the barrage Tuesday began after American aircraft launched airstrikes on Baghdad-controlled barracks across the front line.

The Iraqis retreated, and villagers and Kurdish fighters began moving in on their abandoned positions, seizing six military vehicles, dozens of light weapons and some artillery.

"As coalition forces get nearer to Iraqi cities, Saddam Hussein will react even more furiously than he has now," said Bakhtiyar, a leader of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan.

Bakhtiyar describes Kifrey's position as strategic - at a crossing of routes to the oil center Kirkuk, to Saddam's hometown and power base Tikrit, and to Baghdad, less than 100 miles to the south.

In a statement read Wednesday on Iraqi state television, Saddam warned Kurdish leaders against cooperating with U.S. forces in northern Iraq . "I advise you not to rush and do something that you'll regret so long as you know that this leadership and the government it leads in the face of invaders will remain," according to the statement, read by Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahhaf.

Patriotic Union officials say the Iraqis have moved several tanks into place at the Kifrey front to bolster their positions. A large concentration of Iraqi troops is reported based at Jelola, south of Kifrey - a likely target of coalition planes.

Explosions rocked Kifrey on Tuesday and a mortar landed in the courtyard of Mehdi Hassan Aziz's home, wounding five family members.

"We only came here because we thought it was safer than our house right on the front," said Mohammad Mahdi, a relative. "I put my hand on the door and there was a huge explosion, and I was thrown back."

The hospital in Sulaimaniyah took in 11 of the wounded from Kifrey, hospital official Howar Mustafa said.

Among them were Shler Mahdin, who lost a finger, and her month-old son Shadan, who needed a body cast. When a bomb struck Mahdin's home, she was holding her baby. "What did my baby ever do to Saddam Hussein?" she asked.

Yerish Noori was walking along the street when he heard a huge explosion, fell down and lost consciousness. His bandaged right arm was badly burned. "Saddam Hussein is a murderer," he said. "He plays with our lives."

The United States , which has protected the Kurds' autonomous region with air patrols since 1991, has special forces troops and 1,000 paratroopers in the north. It has begun working with the Kurds' 70,000 soldiers in their joint aim of overthrowing Saddam.

U.S. Marine Maj. Gen. Henry P. Osman, believed to be the highest-ranking U.S. officer in the north, met with Kurdish leaders Jalal Talabani and Massoud Barzani in the northern Iraqi resort town of Dukan on Wednesday.

American special forces gave a joint news conference with Kurdish military leaders Tuesday, describing their apparently successful campaign to drive Ansar al Islam militants out of far eastern Iraq , near the border with Iran.