U.S. officer: Iran sends Iraq bomb parts

BAGHDAD, Iraq - AP - High-tech roadside bombs that have proved particularly deadly to American soldiers are manufactured in Iran and delivered to Iraq on orders from the "highest levels" of the Iranian government, a senior intelligence officer said Sunday.

The officer, briefing reporters on condition he not be further identified, said that between June 2004 and last week, more than 170 Americans had been killed by the bombs, which the military calls "explosively formed projectiles."

Those weapons are capable of destroying an Abrams tank.

The officer said American intelligence analysts believe the EFPs are manufactured in Iran and smuggled into Iraq on orders from the top of the Iranian government. He did not elaborate.

U.S. officials have alleged for years that weapons were entering the country from Iran but had stopped short of alleging involvement by top Iranian leaders.

The U.S. officer said Iran was working through surrogates — mainly "rogue elements" of the Shiite Mahdi Army — to smuggle the EFPs into Iraq. He said most of the components are entering Iraq near Amarah, the Iranian border city of Meran, and the Basra area of southern Iraq.

The U.S. officer said American authorities had briefed Iraq's Shiite-led government on Iran's involvement and Iraqi officials had asked the Iranians to stop. Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, a Shiite, has said he told both the U.S. and Iran that he does not want his country turned into a proxy battlefield.

Al-Maliki, who has been reluctant to crack down on the Mahdi Army, largely because he does not want to lose the support of its leader, Muqtada al-Sadr, said Iraqi security forces would deploy in force this week as part of a U.S.-backed security sweep aimed at stopping the violence in Baghdad.

"The new security plan will not start from a specific area, but it will start from all areas and at the same time and those who will take part in it are from all formations of the army and police," he said earlier in the day. The Iraqi leader has faced criticism that delays in starting the operation have allowed attacks that have killed hundreds over the past few weeks.

In Tikrit, 80 miles north of Baghdad, a suicide truck bomber slammed into a crowd of police lining up for duty Sunday near Tikrit, collapsing the station and killing at least 30 people and wounding 50, police said.

Minutes later, a roadside bomb struck a car on a highway on Tikrit's western outskirts, killing two civilians and wounding two others, police said.

Residents who rushed to the scene of the first bombing tried to help with rescue efforts before civil defense squads arrived with shovels to remove the debris and pull out the dead and those injured. U.S. and Iraqi forces later surrounded the area.

Bashir Masour, a 46-year-old laborer, said the explosion blew out the windows of his house, about 500 yards away.

"I ran to help and I saw destruction everywhere, along with charred bodies and body parts. Blood was spilled across a big area," he said. "I carried six people who I thought were still alive but then realized they had died after being torn apart by shrapnel."

Adwar, about 12 miles southeast of Tikrit, is where former Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein was captured on Dec. 13, 2003.

Insurgents frequently target Iraqi security forces, accusing them of collaborating with the U.S.

A U.S. soldier also was killed Saturday after coming under small-arms fire northeast of Baghdad, the military said, raising the number of American troops who have died this month to 37.

U.S. and Iraqi troops found 14 weapons caches and detained 140 suspects in a week, focusing on mainly Shiite eastern Baghdad in the initial phase of the security sweep, said U.S. Brig. Gen. John Campbell (news, bio, voting record), the deputy commander of American forces in Baghdad.

"With the cache finds this week, the detentions we've made and creating a larger presence on Baghdad streets with the establishment of another combat outpost, we are making headway with the Baghdad security plan," Campbell said. "This is only the beginning."

The chief military spokesman, Maj. Gen. William B. Caldwell, said Wednesday that the much-anticipated Baghdad security operation was under way. His remarks came about a month after President Bush announced he was dispatching 21,500 more troops to curb sectarian bloodletting. The latest plan is the third effort to secure the capital since al-Maliki took office on May 20.

As the Baghdad operation begins, U.S. officials have been stepping up allegations that Iran is assisting Shiite militias that pose a major threat in the capital and surrounding areas.

Last week, U.S. officials said they were investigating allegations that the Shiite lawmaker Jamal Jaafar Mohammed, a member of the bloc that brought al-Maliki to power, was a main conduit for Iranian weapons. Mohammed has believed to have fled to Iran.

The allegations against Iran were made briefing which had been set for last week. But U.S. defense officials said it was postponed so that the Pentagon could review the information.

That appeared aimed at avoiding the embarrassment suffered when evidence of Iraqi unconventional weapons presented by Secretary Colin Powell at the United Nations in 2003 proved to be wrong.

During the briefing, the officer said that one of six Iranians detained in January in a raid on an office in the northern city of Irbil was the operational commander of the Quds Brigade, a unit of the Iranian Revolutionary Guards that trains and equips Shiite militants abroad.

He was identified as Mohsin Chizari, who was apprehended after slipping back into Iraq after a 10-month absence, the officer said.

The Iranians were caught trying to flush documents down the toilet, he said. Bags of their hair were found during the raid, indicating they had tried to change their appearance, he added.

He said the dates of manufacture on weapons found so far indicate they were made after fall of Saddam Hussein — mostly in 2006. He said the "machining" on the components was traceable to Iran but did not elaborate.

In a separate briefing Maj. Gen. Jim Simmons, deputy commander of Multinational Corps-Iraq, told reporters there was no indication Iranian weapons were behind the latest spate of helicopter crashes.