US and Iraqi forces yesterday detained a group of men suspected of abducting and murdering Irish-born aid worker Margaret Hassan last year.
The arrests followed three days of insurgent bombings and shootings which claimed at least 80 lives and wounded dozens more in a bloody baptism for the new government.
In early morning raids troops and police seized 11 people in Madaen, a district 22km (14 miles) south of Baghdad, and recovered clothing, a bag and identity documents which appeared to belong to Ms Hassan. According to a police spokesman five of the suspects admitted complicity in her killing.
Ms Hassan, the head of Care International in Iraq, was kidnapped in the capital last October and later shot. The crime chilled the aid community and baffled security forces because no group claimed responsibility.
The 59-year-old held dual British and Iraqi nationality and spoke fluent Arabic. In two harrowing videos she pleaded for her life and for British troops to leave Iraq.
In Baghdad yesterday more than a dozen gunmen shot dead five Iraqi policemen at a checkpoint and took their weapons. Elsewhere in the capital a car bomb aimed at a US military convoy killed four Iraqis and wounded 12 but apparently left the Americans unscathed. Since Friday at least six US troops have died in other attacks. Gun and rocket attacks in the towns of Falluja and Hilla claimed three lives yesterday.
A suicide bomber rammed his car into a funeral procession for a slain Kurdish official in north Iraq yesterday killing at least 20 people.
The suicide bombing also wounded 30 people in Tal Afar near Mosul, about 390km (240 miles) north of Baghdad.
Meanwhile, British prime minister Tony Blair mounted an impassioned defence of his decision to take Britain to war in the face of fresh disclosures. A leaked memorandum drawn up after high level Downing Street talks suggested that planning for military action was already well under way eight months before the invasion. The Sunday Times published a leaked minute of a meeting held in Downing Street on July 23rd, 2002.
As well as Mr Blair, Lord Boyce, then chief of defence staff, and Lord Goldsmith, the attorney general, foreign secretary Jack Straw, defence secretary Geoff Hoon, MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove and the chairman of the joint intelligence committee, John Scarlett, were also present.
Sir Richard, who had just returned from Washington, said the Americans now saw military action against Iraq as "inevitable", adding that "the intelligence and facts were being fixed around policy". However, Mr Blair said he believed people would support regime change "if the political context were right". - (Guardian service, PA)