A husband, wife killed in Falouja; Bremer, al-Baja Je launch reconciliation initiative

The U.S. administrator of Iraq, Paul Bremer, and the current chairman for the governing council in Iraq, Adnan la-Baja Je, yesterday launched a program for releasing hundreds of thousands of detainees held by the occupation forces in what they called "reconciliation initiative," whose conditions are similar to be conditions placed by the Israeli authorities against the Palestinians on their release.

Among such conditions are that "they were not involved in bloody events," and would have to sign an undertaking not to repeat their acts. On Tuesday evening, the US defense secretary Donald Rumsfeld said that his department discusses several options including the appointment of a General to help US Central head, Army Gen. John Abizaid, the commander of the American forces.

At a time when the American army announced the detention of 80 persons in Baghdad, Bremer considered the release of 506 prisoners out of 13,000 detained by the American forces as but an impetus for the Iraqis who seek reconciliation with their own citizens," adding that "we will permit certain persons who caused problems to return back to their families," noting that this is not applicable to those who committed bloody acts.

The Iraqi police announced yesterday that two Iraqis were killed, in exchanged fire between resistance members and the American forces, in al-Falouja, to the west of Baghdad. But the witness Muhammad Hassan said that his brother Ahmad, and Siham, his brother's wife, were killed when a shell fired by the American army fell on their house. The police officer Ibrahim Ahmad said he had visited the demolished house and saw the two bodies.

In al-Hweijah, the police commander, Ahmad Hassan Ali, said that gunmen opened fire at police barrier between Beji and al-Hweijeh, to the west of Karkouk, and this resulted in killing one Iraqi policeman and one civilian.

One British soldier was killed in a training operation near al-Basra yesterday, according to a British statement. In Karkouk, the police said that attackers fire missiles at a police patrol on Tuesday evening, and this resulted in killing one man and wounding two.