Allied forces mounted one of their fiercest air assaults yet on Baghdad on Saturday, targeting the centre and outskirts of the city that drew blasts of anti-aircraft fire. Earlier in the day, Iraq hit back with a car bomb that killed at least five people at a US Military checkpoint in the South. After racing to within 80 km of Baghdad, US units have been ordered to pause for four to six days because of supply shortages and stiff resistance, US officers said. They said the “operational pause” would allow time for the military to sort out logistics problems along vulnerable supply lines stretching up to 500 km from Kuwait. In Qatar, US Central Command, however, clarified that there had been any pause in military operations. “I think that with respect to a pause, there is no pause on the battlefield,” Major General Victor Renuart told a news conference. The car bombing occurred after US troops paused in their charge on Baghdad to strengthen supply lines against hit-and-run attacks by militiamen. US officials said the vehicle exploded near the Shi’ite Muslim shrine city of Najaf. American soldiers were believed among the dead. Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan said the US United States could expect more suicide attacks on its troops. A bomb crashed into the heart of Baghdad in the afternoon in the latest of a wave of raids on the city in the past 24 hours. In an overnight blitz, at least one cruise missile crashed into the Information Ministry. Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf told reporters that US raids had killed 68 civilians and wounded 107 in the past 24 hours. A hospital doctor said the toll from the market attack on Friday had risen to 62 dead and 49 wounded. US planes also bombed a building where some 200 Iraqi paramilitaries were said to have gathered in Basra. There was no immediate word on casualties. In Kuwait City, an Iraqi missile evaded Patriot defences and slammed into a breakwater, damaging a seafront shopping mall and wounding two people, Kuwaiti officials said. They said the missile, probably a Chinese-made anti-ship Silkworm, had been fired from the vicinity of the Faw peninsula, which British forces said they had captured early in the war. Meanwhile, seven Italian journalists who went missing near Basra turned up in Baghdad on Saturday unharmed, their newspapers said. The seven were taken by Iraqi soldiers from Basra to Baghdad. Francesco Battistini of Milan’s Corriere della Sera, told his newspaper from Baghdad that they had been treated well and were in good condition. As President Saddam Hussein was shown on Iraqi state television on Saturday chairing a meeting of his ministers and senior aides, President Bush, frustrated at criticism that US had underestimated Iraqi resistance, spoke of sacrifices ahead but promised Americans complete victory. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld accused Syria of providing night-vision gadget to Iraq. Damascus dismissed the charge, saying Washington was trying to divert attention from casualties. (Reuters)
