U.S. warplanes intensify raids on Ansar al-Islam position in northern Iraq

HALBJA, March 26 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) – The U.S.-led occupation forces bombarded northern Iraq early Wednesday, March 26, targeting positions of Ansar al-Islam group allegedly linked by the U.S. to al-Qaeda network.

A "terrorist al-Qaeda camp" in northern Iraq was bombed by U.S. warplanes, Mark Brazelton, a lieutenant commander aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt aircraft carrier told reporters.

"We left without knowing the target and once we got there talking to the airborne commander (...) they gave us coordinates," Brazelton was quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) as saying after returning from the bombing mission.

Asked what the target of the raid was, he answered: "It was a terrorist al-Qaeda camp."

He added the camp was hit by guided bombs and that the raid was carried out by three formations each comprising eight fighter bombers.

The public affairs officer on the carrier said the camp housed several pieces of artillery.

"We hit what they asked us to hit," said Lieutenant John Oliveira, without elaborating.

Brazelton said that because of clouds "we couldn't see exactly what was going on down below in the camp" when it was bombed.

Dozens of planes took off from the USS Theodore Roosevelt in the eastern Mediterranean late Tuesday, March 25, for missions in Iraq.

Two dozen F/A-18 Hornets and F-14 Tomcats took part, as well as other military planes, the spokesman said.

They bombed a surface-to-surface missile position in central Iraq, before moving on the bomb the "suspected terrorist camp," Oliveira claimed.

U.S. forces have carried out since the start of the war last Thursday several air strikes in northern Iraq targeting two Islamic groups, particularly Ansar al-Islam (Supporters of Islam).

On Sunday, March 22, a U.S. air assault on Ansar al-Islam and Komala Islami Kurdistan (KIK) in northern Iraq left at least 57 dead. 

After the strikes, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) officials openly challenged Iran, accusing it of providing a rear base for Ansar and plying the group with ammunition, supposedly to harass the PUK as it edges closer to Washington.

But Iran denies any links to the group.

For the Iranian government "Ansar al-Islam is an extremist group with suspect objectives, and there is no link between this group and Iran", Foreign Ministry spokesman Hamid-Reza Asefi was quoted by IRNA as saying.

“No Links”

Ansar has been accused by the United States of trying to develop crude chemical weapons, and of having links to both al-Qaeda network and Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's regime.

But the leader of the group, Najmadin Fatah, repudiated allegations that his group served as a liaison between al-Qaeda and Saddam.

Fatah, who goes by the nom de guerre Mullah Krekar, said in an interview published earlier last month that he was opposed to the Iraqi leader and that his group had no links with al-Qaeda and disclosed pre-9/11 ties with the U.S.

"I never had links with Saddam Hussein's family, Saddam Hussein's government, Saddam Hussein's party, not in the past, not now, not in the future, and not inside Iraq or outside, not directly, not indirectly,” he said.

"I have in my possession irrefutable evidence against the Americans and I am prepared to supply it ... if (the United States) tries to implicate me in an affair linked to terrorism," threatened Fatah.

The group has been blamed for a series of suicide bombings and assassinations against the secular PUK, one of two factions which controls most of northern Iraq and a key U.S. ally in the war against Iraq.

The PUK, which has been battling Ansar al-Islam for the past 18 months, had said more air strikes on the groups were expected.

Ansar controls a tiny pocket of territory between Halabja and the Iranian border, an area around 80 kilometres (50 miles) southeast of the PUK's administrative centre of As-Sulaymaniya.