Two Iraqis killed in Kirkuk blast
US troops find trucks loaded with rockets: 14 rounded up
AFP, Baghdad
The US military said yesterday that two Iraqis were killed by an explosion in the northern city of Kiruk, but would not confirm reports by local officials they were suicide bombers. The blast went off as US troops approached two Iraqis trying to plant an "improvised explosive device (IED)" late Thursday, said a military spokesman who asked not to be named. "The IED exploded killing the two Iraqis," the spokesman said. He could not give any further details. Local civil defence officials in the northern oil center had earlier reported that two suicide bombers blew themselves up late Thursday outside a dry cleaners used by US troops in Kirkuk. They reported no American casualties in the blasts, which came after six other explosions rocked the city, leaving at least two soldiers wounded, officials said. The US military spokesman said he had no reports of suicide bombings and no word on the other explosions. Meanwhile, US troops pursuing two wounded assailants in the Baghdad area found two trucks loaded with hundreds of rockets and a detonator that indicated they were being used to make a bomb, the Pentagon said Thursday. General Richard Myers, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, disclosed the find Wednesday at a news conference here, telling reporters 14 people were detained in the neighborhood where the trucks were found Wednesday. US snipers wounded two people who were preparing to fire a mortar, and then followed them to a compound, he said. "A search of that compound and the neighborhood resulted in finding those individuals along with 12 other Iraqis, and while patrolling these side streets they found two trucks," he said. "One was filled with 800 57mm rockets and the other truck with 750 rockets," he said. "And as they attempted to push further, an apparent detonating device was found as well." "The explosives ordnance teams diagnosed these rockets as a potential bomb that were in a pre-assembly state," he said. It was unclear from Myers' account whether the explosives were for a huge truck bomb or the smaller variety of bombs used in roadside attacks against US troops. There was no immediate information on the identity of those detained. Powerful car bombs have killed scores of people in attacks on the Jordanian Embassy and the UN headquarters in Baghdad.
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