Iraqi Journalist, Son Gunned Down

[David]

AP


Gunmen killed an Iraqi journalist working for a U.S.-funded television station and his son as they left their home Wednesday in the southern city of Basra, an official said. Two more U.S. soldiers were reported dead, one in an ambush in Mosul.

The attacks came amid a growing wave of violence following Iraq's Jan. 30 national elections. On Tuesday, a suicide bomber killed 21 army recruits in Baghdad, in the deadliest attack in the capital since the vote.

In Basra, Abdul Hussein al-Basri, the correspondent of Al-Hurra TV station, and his son were both killed Wednesday in the city's Maqal area, 340 miles southeast of Baghdad, said Nazim al Moussawi, a spokesman for the local government administration.

Launched in February 2004 Al-Hurra, or The Free, was tailored for Arab audiences to compete with other regional stations like Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya. Some Muslim clerics have denounced the TV station as propaganda.

In other developments:


In Iraq's oil-rich north, saboteurs set off explosives Wednesday at a gas pipeline in Fatha district, 15 miles north of Beiji, setting it on fire, officials said. Beiji is 155 miles north of Baghdad. One policeman was injured as workers put out the blaze, which was expected to affect the production of electricity, police said. Officials did not say how long it would take to repair the pipeline.


In Rome, the newspaper that employs an Italian journalist held hostage in Iraq said Wednesday that it has indications she is alive and that intelligence officials have established indirect contact with the kidnappers. Giuliana Sgrena, a reporter for communist daily Il Manifesto, was abducted Friday by a group of gunmen outside Baghdad University. Conflicting claims have appeared on Islamic militant Web sites: One said she had been killed, while another said she would soon be released.


Election workers continue to count ballots for the 275-member National Assembly, 18 provincial councils and a regional parliament for the Kurdish self-governing region in the north. Votes from about 300 ballot boxes must be recounted, delaying the announcement of the final results of the Jan. 30 balloting, an election commission spokesman said Wednesday. The commission had expected to announce final results of the balloting on Thursday. But spokesman Farid Ayar said that the Thursday deadline would slip due to the need for a recount. "We don't know when this will finish," he said. "This will lead to a little postponement in announcing the results."


The 127 Portuguese police serving in Iraq are returning home Thursday after completing their planned 15 months of duty, officials said Wednesday. The contingent halted its patrols in the southern city of Nasiriyah soon after Iraq's Jan. 30 national elections and since then have been preparing for the withdrawal, according to Tavares Belo, a spokesman at Lisbon police headquarters.

President Bush said Al-Hurra was created to "cut through the hateful propaganda that fills the airwaves in the Muslim world."

Al-Basri was also a member of the political office of the Islamic Dawa Party, an influential Shiite movement, and the editor of a local newspaper in Basra, Iraq's second largest city. He also served as the head of the press office at Basra City Council, al-Moussawi said.

Journalists have come under fire repeatedly in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion. The Brussels-based International Federation of Journalists reported in January that Iraq was the deadliest place in the world for journalists last year with 49 deaths.

Meanwhile, the U.S. military on Wednesday announced the deaths of two more American soldiers.

A military statement said one U.S. soldier died of a gunshot wound at a logistical support area in Balad, north of Baghdad. The soldier, from 1st Corps Support Command, suffered a gunshot wound on Tuesday and was pronounced dead at the scene. Camp Anaconda in Balad, is 50 miles north of Baghdad.

The second soldier, assigned to Task Force Freedom, was shot and killed on Sunday while on patrol in Mosul, the U.S. command said. No further details were released on either soldier pending notification of kin.