Nine dead bodies were found in southern Baghdad, including the bodies of three policemen and that of a child, police said Tuesday. The police also said that unknown gunmen killed member of the Islamic Party Mohammad Al-Duleimi, who is a mosque imam, noting that the number of imams assassinated since the US invasion in 2003 has reached 150. An Iraqi soldier was killed and two others were wounded on a highway linking Tikrit and Kirkuk in northern Baghdad.Meanwhile, eyewitnesses said two US soldiers were wounded when their Humvee car was attacked by unidentified gunmen in the southern City of Kout. In the northern City of Mosul, gunmen killed a pharmacist and wounded two other civilians. Two other civilians were wounded in Mosul as a result of the explosion of three roadside bombs. In Huweijah, west of Kirkuk, two civilians were killed and five injured when Multi-National Forces opened fire in the wake of a bomb explosion. An Iraqi soldier was killed and two others were wounded in an armed attack in the same area.
Amid these developments, South Korean troops started withdrawal from the northern City of Irbil. A Korean source told KUNA the total number of withdrawn soldiers reached 1000 out of 3600 deployed in 2004.