Iraq

Militants shot dead two off-duty policemen in a market in eastern Mosul, police said.

Baghdad Operations Command said on Saturday that Iraqi forces were able to arrest 37 armed militants and defuse 24 bombs were intended for detonation in various parts of the Iraqi capital Baghdad.

Gunmen on a motorcycle assassinated an official of Iraq's biggest Shiite party Friday in the southern city of Basra, police said. Sheik Salim al-Dirraji was gunned down in the Hayania district, which had been a stronghold of the Mahdi Army...

Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said on Saturday that the country's security forces have managed to save Baghdad from a "siege by terrorists" backed by foreign nations.

A roadside bomb wounded Khalid Mohammed, an official of the Iraqi Islamic Party in Falluja, and three other people, 50 km (30 miles) west of Baghdad, police said.

Police say a former Army medic made famous by a photograph of him carrying an injured Iraqi boy during the first week of the war has died of an apparent overdose in Pinehurst...After he returned from Iraq, Dwyer struggled with post traumatic stress.

The U.S. military touts the relative security of Anbar — once one of the most restive areas in Iraq — after working with tribal sheiks to combat al-Qaida. But the rise of the sheiks has set off a new political conflict, and tensions still simmer...

It's Staff Sgt. Edgar Covarrubias' second Fourth of July in Iraq. No family barbecue, no fireworks for the kids, but Covarrubias says he'll call his mom, wife and kids to share the day anyway.

It's Staff Sgt. Edgar Covarrubias' second Fourth of July in Iraq. No family barbecue, no fireworks for the kids, but Covarrubias says he'll call his mom, wife and kids to share the day anyway.

A federal judge in Riverside, Calif., has ordered two Marines released from jail despite their refusal to testify before a grand jury investigating the alleged killing of Iraqi detainees in 2004.

Iraq's prime minister plans trips to Europe and the Persian Gulf this month, apparently hoping improved security at home will pay dividends in greater international support — including from a country that did not back the U.S. invasion.

Syria has returned a marble artifact to Iraq that was stolen from one of the country's archaeological sites.

A car bomb has exploded near one of Baghdad's major hospitals, killing four people and wounding 10. Officials say the explosion took place in front of the morgue of Baghdad's Al-Yarmukh hospital.

Gunmen killed an off-duty policeman in eastern Mosul, police said...Gunmen shot dead a civilian inside a computer games arcade in northern Mosul, police said.

U.S. officials condoned Hunt Oil Co efforts to obtain an exploration deal with Iraq's Kurdish regional government, contrary to public statements discouraging it, according to documents cited by a congressional committee.

The Iraqi government has banned candidates in upcoming provincial elections from using pictures in their campaign materials of people not running for office, the government's spokesman said Thursday.

Iraqi security forces fighting militants in southeastern Iraq have arrested several bodyguards assigned to a provincial governor — but not the governor himself, Iraqi officials said Thursday.

Later this summer, there will be a new top American military leader in Baghdad. Lt. Gen. Ray Odierno will take over from his boss Gen. David Petraeus, who is being promoted to a job overseeing the entire Middle East region.

Iraq is expecting visits soon from Jordan's King Abdullah and Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan, easing its regional diplomatic isolation, the foreign minister said on Wednesday.

Iraq's foreign minister told lawmakers Tuesday the U.S. made major concessions in talks on a new security agreement, urging them to approve the deal to keep U.S. troops here after the U.N. mandate expires at the end of the year.