Naseer Al-Nahr, Asharq Al-Awsat

BAGHDAD, 30 November 2003 — Iraqi guerrillas ambushed a convoy of Spanish military intelligence officers on a highway south of Baghdad yesterday, killing at least seven agents and wounding one. Television footage showed a crowd gathered after the attack, chanting slogans supporting ousted leader Saddam Hussein and kicking the bodies.

In Madrid, the Spanish Defense Ministry said coalition forces found the bodies and the wounded man at the site of the attack on a convoy near Suwayrah, 30 km from Baghdad. The group which was driving in two vehicles was on its way back to the capital, according to Spanish media.

A reporter for Sky television news said his team had arrived at the site before coalition forces and saw a small crowd of Iraqis around the bodies, chanting pro-Saddam slogans and kicking them. The team fled after the crowd turned its attention on them. Spanish radio reported that the attack was carried out with mortars and grenades. Three helicopters from the Spanish contingent were at the scene of the ambush and witnesses said that two vehicles were on fire, Spanish-language CNN+ television reported.

Spain was one of the staunchest supporters of the US-led invasion to oust Saddam earlier this year and sent 1,300 soldiers to help maintain order.

Hours after the attack, Spanish Defense Minister Federico Trillo convened high-ranking military officials in his office.

In previous attacks, a Spanish diplomat attached to Spain’s intelligence agency was assassinated near his residence in Baghdad on Oct. 9, and a Spanish Navy captain was killed in the truck bombing of the United Nations headquarters in Baghdad on Aug. 19. Other partners in the US-led coalition have also been targeted. On Nov. 12, a truck bomb outside the Italian barracks in Nassiriyah killed 19 Italians and 14 others in an apparent attempt to weaken the resolve of Washington’s allies. On Thursday, insurgents fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the Italian mission in Baghdad, causing damage but no injuries.

The ambush came on a day when the top US military official in Iraq said the United States suspected Al-Qaeda operatives had taken part in the long string of attacks on US and Iraqi targets, but had no conclusive evidence of involvement. Lt. Gen. Ricardo Sanchez also said some US-trained Iraqi police appeared to have planned some assaults on coalition forces. He said US military officials were concerned that some attacks on Americans had been coordinated by a few of the numerous Iraqi civilians hired by the US military, who may glean intelligence on troop movements and travels of high-ranking officers. “Clearly those are concerns we have. We try to do the vetting (of Iraqi employees) as close as we can,” Sanchez told reporters. “There have been instances when police were coordinating attacks against the coalition and against the people.”

Meanwhile, Iraq’s US-installed interim leadership held key talks on demands from the powerful Shiite religious hierarchy for immediate elections that have undermined the democratic credentials of the US-led coalition and left its plans for an accelerated transfer of power in tatters.

Top Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani has rejected the arcane system of indirect selection by caucus announced two weeks ago to put a caretaker government in place by June next year.

The plan criticized by Sistani also provided for the drafting of a basic law by end-February 2004 and the selection of a transitional assembly by end-May 2004 ahead of the caretaker government’s formation.

— Additional input from agencies