11/15/2004 4:00:00 PM GMT
U.S. jets bombed several areas in the Iraqi city Baqouba while soldiers engaged in gunbattles with Iraqi fighters after the later seized police stations and other areas in the city on Monday.
At least 20 Iraqi fighters have been killed in the violence in the city.
Explosions were heard all over Baquba, 40 miles northeast of Baghdad, as U.S. and Iraqi forces engaged in gunbattles with resistance fighters who attacked a police station in the city, witnesses said.
Witnesses reported that another police station in the town of Buhriz, just south of Baquba, was attacked.
U.S. warplanes dropped two 500-pound bombs on Baquba after 15 fighters arrived from outside the city and joined the rest of the resistance fighters in theri attack on the police stations.
Fighters were seen on buildings’ rooftops, others set up road blocks and planted roadside bombs, U.S. military spokesman Captain Bill Coppernoll said.
About 20 Iraqi fighters have been killed in the gunbattles with the American soldiers, while the occupation forces launched air strikes on the city.
Four U.S. soldiers were reported wounded in Monday fighting in Baqouba, Coppernoll said, two of them seriously.
Eight people were brought to Baqouba hospital dead from the fighting, including one policeman, eleven other came in wounded, among which were three policemen, doctor at the hospital said.
Meanwhile, Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's office announced that two of his female relatives who were kidnapped last Tuesday have been released.
Allawi's cousin, Ghazi Allawi, 75, his cousin's wife and his cousin's pregnant daughter-in-law were kidnapped last week at gunpoint in western Baghdad's Yarmouk neighborhood.
"Yes, yes, the two women were released yesterday," an Allawi spokesman said on condition of anonymity. The spokesman said they have received no information about the PM cousin, Ghazi Allawi.
Elsewhere, a Red Cross spokesman said that a relief convoy of ambulances and supplies was prevented by Iraqi authorities and U.S. Marines from entering Fallujah on Monday.
The Red Crescent and Red Cross have been barred from accessing Fallujah civilians over the past week since the U.S.-led offensive broke out last Monday.
Powell resigns
Secretary of State Colin Powell has resigned from President Bush's Cabinet, high-ranking State Department officials said Monday.
"The Secretary announced to his staff this morning that he had submitted his resignation on Friday. He said he was staying on until a successor is confirmed and on board," a State Department official, who asked not to be named, said.
An administration official said that Powell had said he will stay in the cabinet "until such a time as a replacement is named."
Powell's departure started a new week of Cabinet shuffling for Bush, who is has just won another presidential period.
"I do expect some announcements shortly regarding members of the Cabinet," White House press secretary Scott McClellan told reporters at the White House earlier on Monday. "There are a few resignation. I expect four today."
However, McClellan said he did not expect any announcements Monday on replacements.
Most speculations point at UN Ambassador John Danforth, a Republican and former U.S. senator from Missouri to replace Powell.