U.S. opens major ground assault in Fallujah
U.S. military launches ground offensive Monday;
10,000 to 15,000 troops line Iraqi city's borders
BY JIM KRANE
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
NEAR FALLUJAH, Iraq — U.S.
troops backed by thunderous air and
artillery barrages launched a ground
offensive Monday to seize key insur
gent strongholds inside Fallujah, the
city that became Iraq’s major sanctu
ary for Islamic extremists who fought
Marines to a standstill last April.
Two Marines were killed when
their bulldozer flipped over into the
Euphrates near Fallujah, and a
military spokesman estimated 42 in
surgents were killed across the city in
bombardment and skirmishes before
the main assault began.
Hours after starting the offensive,
U.S. tanks and Humvees from the
1st Infantry Division entered the
northeastern Askari neighborhood.
U.S. troops advanced slowly after
dusk on the Jolan neighborhood, a
warren of alleyways where Sunni
militants have dug in, and by dawn
TUesday some U.S. elements were
inside the district. Artillery, tanks and
warplanes pounded the district’s
northern edge, softening the defens
es and trying to set off any bombs or
boobytraps planted by the militants.
Marines were visible on rooftops in
Jolan. A reporter at a U.S. camp near
the city saw orange explosions light
ing up the district and a fire burning
on the city’s edge.
Heavy firing continued into the
pre-dawn hours Tuesday, and resi
dents reached by satellite telephone
reported the constant drone of war
planes overhead.
A U.S. jet fired an air-to-ground
missile at a building late Monday
from which U.S. and Iraqi forces had
taken fire, the U.S. command said.
The building was destroyed.
U.S. troops cut off electricity to the
city, and most private generators
were not working. Residents said
they were without running water and
were worried about food shortages
because most shops in the city have
been closed for the past two days.
Masked insurgents roamed Fallu
jah streets throughout the day. One
group of four fighters, two of them
draped with belts of ammunition,
moved through narrow passageways,
firing on U.S. forces with small arms
and mortars. Mosque loudspeakers
blared, “God is great, God is great.”
Just outside the Jolan and Askari
neighborhoods, Iraqi troops de
ployed with U.S. forces took over a
train station.
The top U.S. commander in Iraq,
Gen. George Casey, predicted a “major
confrontation” in the operation he said
was called “al-Fajr,” Arabic for
“dawn.” He told reporters in Washing
ton that 10,000 to 15,000 U.S. troops
along with a smaller number of Iraqi
forces were encircling the city.
Overall, the main force did not ap
pear to have moved deeply into Fal
lujah on Monday. Most U.S. units ap
peared to be lined up at the edge of
their neighborhoods with some
scouts and perhaps special operators
venturing inside.
U.S. military trial halted due
to incompetence of tribunal
Osama bin Laden's driver won't be tried unless
the military commission's guidelines are changed
BY PAISLEY DODDS
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
GUANTANAMO BAY NAVAL
BASE, Cuba — A U.S. federal
court halted proceedings ahead of the
military trial of Osama bin Laden’s
driver Monday, saying his status as an
enemy combatant had to be deter
mined by a competent tribunal.
It was the first time a federal court
has halted proceedings ahead of tri
als before U.S. military commis
sions, which had been resurrected
from World War 11, at the Guan
tanamo Bay Naval Base.
A U.S. District Court judge in
Washington halted the trial of Salim
Ahmed Hamdan, 34, of Yemen, in a
lawsuit filed by his lawyers.
“Unless and until a competent tri
bunal determines that petitioner is not
entitled to protections afforded prison
ers of war under Article 4 of the Gene
va Convention ... of Aug. 12,1949, he
may not be tried by military commis
sion for the offenses with which he is
charged,” U.S. District Judge James
Robertson said in his ruling.
The court also ruled that unless
the military commission guidelines
are changed to conform to the Uni
form Code of Military Justice,
Hamdan cannot be tried and must
be moved from the pre-commission
wing at the Camp Delta prison camp
to the general population.
Four terror suspects set to go be
fore the commissions were moved
out of solitary cells recently to a pre
commission wing of Delta.
Hamdan’s military-appointed de
fense lawyer, Lt. Cmdr. Charlie Swift,
also asked the commission Monday
to reinstate two members and an al
ternate who were dismissed after
challenges to their impartiality.
Swift said he would not have chal
lenged them in August if he knew his
client would be penalized by facing a
smaller three-member commission.
Hamdan’s military trial was to
have begun Dec. 7 at this U.S. base
in eastern Cuba.
The ruling in Washington came as
lawyers began pretrial motion hear
ings in the case of Hamdan, who is
charged with conspiracy to commit
war crimes, murder and terrorism.
Hamdan said he never supported
terrorism, was not an al-Qaida
member and only earned a pittance
driving bin Laden.
“These commissions were in
tended for people like Osama bin
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Laden, not a mechanic who drove
people around,” Swift said. “The
fact that we’re doing this will taint
the reputation of military justice
for years to come.”
Hamdan was found to be an ene
my combatant last month by a review
tribunal, a classification affording
fewer legal protections than prisoner
of war. His lawyer was barred from
representing him at the hearing.
Swift’s federal lawsuit is one of
more than 60 similar challenges, ar
guing that the commissions are illegal
and should not have jurisdiction.
Since a U.S. Supreme Court ruling
in June cleared allowed detainees to
challenge detentions in U.S. courts,
civilian attorneys have poured into
Guantanamo to meet with clients.
Some of the 550 prisoners from
more than 40 countries have been
held for nearly three years, but few
have had access to attorneys and
only four have been charged.
Since President Bush ordered
the commissions, defense attorneys
have said the rules are so vague that a
fair trial is impossible. There is no
specific appeal process, and lawyers
are still debating what type of evi
dence can be used during trials.
The review tribunals were set up
after the Supreme Court decision,
and since then more than 300 cases
have been reviewed. Only one man,
a Pakistani, has been freed.
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Bankrupt church's
request deferred by
federal judge
Roman Catholic archdiocese' request for independent
trustee to handle assets may be renewed in one year
BY WILLIAM MCCALL
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
PORTLAND — An unusual request
to assign an independent trustee to
handle the assets of the first Roman
Catholic archdiocese in the nation to
declare bankruptcy over priest sex
abuse claims was deferred until next
year, a judge ruled Monday.
U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Elizabeth
Perris told one of the individual
creditors the request could be re
newed next May or June, when the fi
nancial reorganization if the
Archdiocese of Portland is expected
to start taking shape.
“Let me know if you need it back
on the docket and we’ll set another
hearing,” Perris said.
Paul DuFresne, one of the many in
dividual creditors who have filed
claims, had filed a motion seeking to
create a separate account to hold
archdiocese assets until a Chapter 11
reorganization plan is approved.
As DuFresne noted in his motion,
the archdiocese “has estimated in
ARCHDIOCESE, page 6
Ivory Coast: French military forces
claim they did not intend overthrow
Continued from page 3
that President Gbagbo is going to be
overthrown,” presidential spokesman
Desire Tagro said.
The French denied surrounding
the house or intending to oust Gbag
bo, saying forces only were securing
a temporary base at a hotel a few
hundred yards away for about 1,300
foreigners who had taken refuge at a
French military base.
“Everything should go back to nor
mal,” French mission commander
Gen. Henri Poncet said on state TV,
alongside Ivory Coast chief of army
staff Gen. Matthias Doue. “It is ab
solutely not a matter of ousting Presi
dent Laurent Gbagbo.”
State radio and TV, however, deliv
ered urgent calls for loyalists to gath
er at Gbagbo’s house.
Thousands responded, chanting
against the French: “The whites don’t
like the blacks, but we don’t care!”
Some signs declared, “Ivory Coast is
a sovereign state. ”
The crowd swarmed one foreigner
— by appearance an immigrant from a
neighboring northern country —
caught up in their midst, kicking and
beating him. “Kill him,” young men
shouted, before he was dragged into
the crowd.
Six men, faces painted black, forced
an AP reporter from his taxi at gun
point and commandeered the vehicle.
French forces fired warning shots,
witnesses and protesters said. Doctors
said many of those treated Monday
had been trampled trying to get away,
although they reported removing bul
lets from several wounded.
French military spokesman Col.
Henry Aussavy said he knew ov no one
shot by French forces. Ivory Coast se
curity forces also have moved forceful
ly at times against the loyalists.
One of the injured in Abidjan’s
Cocody hospital, Claude Akoun, said
he and three other demonstrators
were shot by French soldiers near
Gbagbo’s residence, after they
walked toward the troops, insulting
them. “The soldiers opened fire. I
was shot in the leg and fell,” he said.
Red Cross official Kim Gordon-Bates
said the casualty toll since Saturday
had climbed to “over 500 wounded —
much more than that.” Loyalist mobs
were blocking efforts to set up an emer
gency clinic for the injured, he said.
A standoff arose outside Abidjan, as
several hundred loyalist youths stood
on a main road, blocking a 70-vehicle
heavily armed convoy of French rein
forcements trying to enter the city.
Tensions crossed Ivory Coast’s bor
ders. U.N. officials said more than
1,000 refugees fled into neighboring
Liberia. Guinea, to the north, said it
was sending military reinforcements
to its border.
After Saturday’s airstrike on the
French military post, France hit back,
wiping out Ivory Coast’s newly built
up air force — two Russian-made
Sukhoi jet fighters and at least three
helicopter gunships — on the ground.
Machete-waving mobs sought re
venge against French targets. With
armored vehicles and helicopter
gunships deployed, France used
tear gas and concussion grenades to
quell the mobs.
Associated Press reporter Nafi
Dioaf in Dakar, Senegal,
contributed to this report