Car bomb kills 14; US troops kill 5 gunmen

U.S. Deaths

As of Friday, at least 3,901 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Baghdad ? A car bomb left at least 14 people dead in the capital on Friday, while U.S. troops chasing extremists in one of their last remaining bastions in central Iraq said they killed five al-Qaida gunmen.

In Baghdad, police claimed to have uncovered a weapons cache on property owned by the son of Adnan al-Dulaimi, one of Iraq’s most influential Sunni politicians. His son, Maki Adnan al-Dulaimi, was jailed a month ago for his alleged involvement with some car bombs found at his father’s Baghdad compound.

The midday explosion in Tayaran Square – a predominantly Shiite area that has been targeted by insurgents in the past – came just after Friday prayers. The downtown square is crowded with falafel and other food stands, and is popular with people hawking second-hand and cheap clothes. In late May, a car bomb killed 23 people in the square.

The bombing, one of the most violent in recent days, comes at a time when residents of Baghdad have slowly been emerging from their homes following a significant dip in violence since June.

A surge by almost 30,000 U.S troops, a cease-fire declared by radical Shiite extremist Muqtada al-Sadr, and the growth of anti-al-Qaida in Iraq groups in Anbar province, Baghdad and elsewhere has reduced violence by 60 percent, according to the U.S. military.

One of the few remaining hot spots is Diyala province just north of Baghdad, where many Islamic extremist have fled. The U.S. military said it had killed four heavily armed gunmen tied to al-Qaida in Iraq in an operation near Muqdadiyah in Diyala. Another was killed in a predominantly Sunni area south of Baghdad.

“These operations are examples of our continued success against al-Qaida,” said Maj. Winfield Danielson, a spokesman for the U.S.-led Multinational Forces. “Iraqi and coalition forces are disrupting (al-Qaida) operations and diminishing their pool of manpower, but they still pose a threat to innocent Iraqis.”

Iraqi police reported that militants killed five Iraqis, including a police officer, in separate attacks around the Diyala capital of Baqouba.