US soldier killed, two wounded, in Iraq mortar attack

BAGHDAD Jan 3 - A US soldier was killed in a mortar assault on a military base north of Baghdad, the US Army said on Saturday, and a top commander warned attacks by guerrilla insurgents were growing more sophisticated.

A US Army spokesman said several mortars were fired at a base near the town of Balad, about 80 km (50 miles) north of Baghdad, on Friday evening, killing one soldier and wounding two others, all from the 4th Infantry Division.

``The base came under mortar attack and one soldier was killed by shrapnel, while two others were wounded,'' Sergeant Robert Cargie, a 4th Infantry spokesman, told reporters.

He said six people were detained in connection with the assault and the two wounded soldiers, who were taken to a nearby field hospital, were in a stable condition.

News of the attack came a day after guerrillas shot down an OH-58 Kiowa Warrior helicopter outside the town of Falluja, west of Baghdad. It was the sixth US helicopter to be brought down by Iraqi insurgents since October.

A policeman who witnessed the crash said the helicopter was hit by a missile before falling to the ground. One pilot was killed and the other wounded. It was the first time a Kiowa, a nimble craft used for observation, had been shot down in Iraq.

US forces quickly surrounded the crash site to keep witnesses and journalists at bay.

American soldiers detained three Iraqis working for Reuters as they covered the aftermath of the crash. A Reuters driver working with the three said they had earlier been fired on by US troops as they filmed a checkpoint close to the site.

A US Army spokesman separately told a news conference in Baghdad that guerrillas posing as journalists had fired on US soldiers guarding the area and four were later detained.

At the same news conference, Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, a senior military spokesman, said the average number of daily attacks on coalition forces had fallen to around 20 a day, from as many as 50 a day in November, but warned they were growing more sophisticated.

He pointed to the New Year's Eve car bombing of an upscale restaurant in central Baghdad, which killed eight people and wounded around 30 others, saying it was the first attack of its kind on a purely civilian target.

``We are seeing a small uptick in the capability of the enemy, they are getting a little more complex,'' Kimmitt said.

``For what reason, we don't know, but they are getting a little more sophisticated of late.''

As part of operation Iron Grip, an ongoing effort to root out suspected insurgents hiding out in Baghdad, the 1st Armored Division used AC-130s and A-10 ``Warthog'' planes to bombard positions to the south of the city late into Friday night.

The sound of artillery, mortar bombs and fighter plane machine guns rattled and clattered over the capital for several hours, but military spokesmen would provide no details of what results the operation produced.

In Kirkuk, 250 km (155 miles) north of Baghdad, ethnic tensions that have flared on several occasions in recent days, resulting in the deaths of at least six Iraqis, appeared to abate as US forces and local authorities imposed a curfew.

Tensions boiled to the surface earlier this week after Arab and Turkish-speaking Turkmen residents marched on the headquarters of a Kurdish party in the oil-rich city to protest against a Kurdish political push for more control in the area.

The US interim governor in Iraq, Paul Bremer, and British envoy Sir Jeremy Greenstock flew to the northern Kurdish region on Friday and held talks with Kurdish leaders in what appeared an attempt to calm tempers. - Reuters