U.S. kills 17 insurgents in Kufa

Coalition: No evidence of wedding at strike site in desert

Saturday, May 22, 2004

(6:51 PM ET) (22:51 GMT)

The Cable News Network

"The building seemed to be somewhat of a dormitory. You had over 300 sets of bedding gear in it. You had a tremendous number of pre-packaged clothing -- apparently about a hundred sets of pre-packaged clothing. It is expected that when foreign fighters come in from other countries, they come to this location, they change their clothes into typical Iraqi clothing sets."

KUFA, Iraq -- CNN
U.S. soldiers killed 17 suspected insurgents early Sunday and found a large cache of weapons at a mosque during an operation in the city of Kufa, a stronghold of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr and his Mehdi Army militia, military officials said.

Preceded by a heavy artillery barrage, more than 20 tanks, armored personnel carriers and hundreds of troops entered the darkened city after leaving their base in nearby Najaf late Saturday.

The soldiers were aided in their search of the mosque by Iraqi civil defense forces, the military said.

It marked the first time U.S. troops had entered Kufa since the intense insurgency began.

CNN's Jane Arraf, reporting from an armored personnel carrier, described the sound of the vehicles rolling through the streets as "intimidating."

* Coalition: Target not a wedding

* Blasts rock Baghdad

* Other developments

(More: CNN.com / World)

2004 © Cable News Network LP, LLLP.

Dan