Gunmen shelled the heavily fortified Green Zone in central Baghdad early Tuesday, and U.S. and Iraqi commanders claimed over 400 suspects were captured during an offensive to retake the northern town of Tal Afar.
Two mortar rounds went off near a military hospital inside the protected area that houses the Iraqi government, parliament, and foreign missions, police said. There were no reports of casualties.
Meanwhile, U.S. commanders in Tal Afar said that more than 400 suspects were detained as a result of recent offensive there. The Iraqi military reported on Tuesday that its troops had captured 36 more suspects, including a Yemeni citizen, just south of Tal Afar, The AP reported.
In other icidents on Tuesday, gunmen shot dead two Sunni clerics in Baqouba, a town 35 miles northeast of Baghdad. Elsewhere, two truck drivers delivering concrete walls from a factory in Iraqi Kurdistan were ambushed and killed in Baghdad.
Police found the body of a former judge in Baghdad's eastern neighborhood of Sadr City. A note left next to it said: "This is the destiny of those who support Saddam."
In addition, a bomb planted aboard a minibus exploded in Hilla, a town 60 miles south of Baghdad. Two civilians were killed and six wounded, police said. In Samarra, north of Baghdad, American troops killed two armed men, who were trying to plant a roadside bomb, the US military said.
