IRAQ:Iraqi and US forces killed 50 people in a central Baghdad district they described as riddled with "terrorist hideouts", Iraq's government said yesterday, as US aircraft and helicopters prowled overhead.
Details of the battle around Haifa Street remained sketchy and the US military declined to give a casualty figure. It said soldiers came under rocket and gunfire early yesterday, the fourth day of fighting in the area.
By Iraqi official estimates, more than 130 people have been killed since Saturday. This includes 27 civilians on Saturday, who have been portrayed as the victims of Sunni insurgents active in the area, which is 2km (one mile) from the Green Zone government compound.
"There are many terrorist hideouts in Haifa Street," Iraqi government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh told a news conference, adding that some foreign Arab suspects had been detained.
But one of Iraq's top Sunni political leaders, Adnan al-Dulaimi, said the fighting on Haifa Street was simply a front for Shias pushing Sunnis out of the capital: "It is a pretext that there are terrorists. They are poor, oppressed people."
The United Nations has called the flight of 3.5 million Iraqis - an eighth of the population - the worst in the region since Palestinians left their lands in 1948 and has urged states where half a million fled last year not to deport them.
Northeast of Baghdad, in Diyala province, where Sunni rebels are also active, Iraqi army sources said Iraqi and US troops had killed dozens of gunmen in fighting near Balad Ruz.