Bomb in Mosul Kills Five U.S. Troops, 2 Iraqis

Bomb in Mosul Kills Five U.S. Troops, 2 Iraqis
By Ernesto Londoño
Copyright by The Washington Post
Friday, April 10, 2009; 10:44 AM
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/04/10/AR2009041000600.html?hpid=topnews


BAGHDAD, April 10 -- Five U.S. soldiers were killed Friday morning in a suicide bombing in the northern city of Mosul, the deadliest attack on U.S. troops since March 2008, the military said.

Two Iraqi National Police officers were also killed.

Two American soldiers and 20 Iraqi National Police officers were wounded in the attack at the Iraqi National Police headquarters, located in southwestern Mosul.

The military said two men suspected of involvement in the attack have been detained.

An Iraqi police official said the explosives were loaded in a truck that managed to drive into the main gate of the station about 10:30 a.m. local time.

Attacks against U.S. troops in Iraq have decreased sharply, but Mosul and its surroundings, the last urban stronghold of al-Qaeda in Iraq, have bedeviled American and Iraqi forces in recent years.

The attack comes a day after the six year anniversary of the fall of Baghdad. Many hard-line supporters of Saddam Hussein found refuge in Mosul after the U.S. invasion. Crackdowns on other insurgent strongholds in Iraq prompted extremists to move to that area in recent years.

The second-deadliest attack on U.S. soldiers this year also happened in Mosul. Four American soldiers and an interpreter were killed there Feb. 9 when a suicide bomber rammed a vehicle rigged with explosives into a U.S. armored vehicle.

U.S. military deaths in Iraq reached a record low last month, with nine casualties.