U.S. strikes kill 15 in Fallujah

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- U.S. warplanes, tanks and artillery repeatedly hit at Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's terror network in the insurgent stronghold of Fallujah on Saturday, while two British Muslim leaders came to Baghdad to try to convince his followers to release a British hostage.

The strikes in Fallujah targeted two buildings where militants were allegedly meeting and a cluster of rebel-built fortifications used to mount attacks on nearby Marine positions, the U.S. military said. Doctors said 16 people were killed and 37 wounded.

An American soldier was reported killed by a bomb Saturday, and the U.S. military said four Marines died in separate incidents Friday. A statement said the Marines were involved in a security operation in Anbar province, which includes Fallujah, Ramadi and other places that see frequent clashes between U.S. forces and insurgents. No further details were disclosed.

In Baghdad, gunmen fired on a vehicle carrying Iraqi National Guard applicants, killing six people, police said.

The National Guard also clashed with unidentified gunmen in Haswa, south of the capital, injuring four people, hospital officials said. The shooting lasted about a half hour, witnesses said.

In other violence:

Five mortar shells struck the Iraqi Oil Ministry in Baghdad, shattering windows and causing minor damage to the building.

Several explosions rocked the Iraqi capital late Saturday, but it was not immediately clear what caused the blasts.

In Fallujah, explosions lit up the night sky for hours before dawn Saturday and at least two buildings in the city center were wrecked, witnesses said. Doctors said eight people were killed and 15 wounded. Explosions rocked the city again after dark Saturday. Eight people were killed and 22 injured in the blasts, said Dr. Ahmed Khalil at Fallujah General Hospital.

American troops have not entered Fallujah since ending a three-week siege of the city in April that killed hundreds but have staged repeated attacks on sites the U.S. military described as being used by al-Zarqawi's followers.

In a statement released on the Internet, al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad group said the death of its spiritual leader in a U.S. missile strike earlier this month had only increased its determination to fight the United States and its allies in Iraq.

Two senior officials of the Muslim Council of Britain arrived in Iraq's capital on Saturday to try to win the freedom of Kenneth Bigley, a British civil engineer who was kidnapped Sept. 16 with the two Americans who were slain.

Al-Zarqawi's group claimed responsibility for the abduction and demanded the release of female Iraqi prisoners at American-controlled prisons -- a move U.S. officials have ruled out.

"We will do everything to contact them [the captors] while we are here," Daud Abdullah, assistant secretary-general of the British council, told reporters after talks at the British Embassy.

He conceded, however, that his delegation had not arranged any meetings with Iraqi religious or political leaders and did not know whether they would be able to reach the kidnappers.

"The message is simple, it's a humanitarian one ... he [Bigley] was a noncombatant, Islam does not endorse the capture of noncombatants, let alone the killing of them," Abdullah said.

A posting on an Islamic Internet site Saturday claimed al-Zarqawi's followers had killed Bigley, but the Foreign Office in London said the claim was not credible.

Iraqi police in Basra said Saturday that they had arrested three kidnapping suspects and freed an Iraqi hostage who had been selling mobile phones. Police said the suspects were part of a kidnapping gang but did not provide other details.