Other key developments in the war with Iraq

  • All oil fields in Iraq now fall within areas controlled by the U.S. coalition, U.S. Central Command said.
  • Iraqi police and U.S. troops jointly patrolled Baghdad streets to quell the lawlessness that engulfed the capital after the collapse of Saddam Hussein’s regime. Looting eased, officials said.
  • Eleven containers buried close to an artillery ammunition plant in southern Iraq were discovered by U.S. troops and could be dual-use chemical and biological laboratories, U.S. Army Brig. Gen. Ben Freakley told CNN.
  • The Bush administration said it will consider diplomatic, economic and other steps against Syria because of concerns that Damascus is harboring Iraqi fugitives and tested chemical weapons.
  • An Iraqi nuclear scientist, Jaffar al-Jaffer, surrendered to authorities in a Middle Eastern country and is being interviewed by American officials, a U.S. official said.
  • U.S. commanders said that Syrians were among the foreigners helping Iraqis resist American troops in Baghdad.
  • U.S. military troops were packing up Patriot antimissile batteries in Israel, a day after Israeli officials said there was no longer a threat of an Iraqi missile attack.
  • The U.S. military said a Patriot missile downed a U.S. Navy fighter jet on April 2, killing the pilot. It would be the third instance in the war of a Patriot failing to distinguish friendly from enemy targets.
  • Almost all the 30,000 Iraqis who fled to the Iranian border to escape fighting in Baghdad and Nasiriyah have returned home, international relief organizations said.
  • The U.S. Army’s much-heralded 4th Infantry Division — which all but missed the campaign to oust Saddam — rumbled into southern Iraq on Monday to reinforce the war effort.
  • Two of the five Navy aircraft carrier battle groups engaged in the war are heading home this week. Commanders are reviewing the timetable for sending the Army’s 1st Cavalry Division into Iraq.
  • The United States will be playing a leading role in helping Iraqis recover antiquities stolen by looters from Iraqi museums in recent days, Secretary of State Colin Powell said Monday.
  • The United States formally begins creation of a new Iraqi government on today, convening a meeting of 75 Iraqi community leaders and exile figures in Nasiriyah.
  • A tour of a home of Saddam’s eldest son, Odai, on Monday showed he lived a life of fast cars, expensive liquor and easy women. In a gymnasium plastered with photographs of naked women, Army troops found photos of — fully clad in evening gowns — Jenna and Barbara Bush, President Bush’s 21-year-old twin daughters.