US helicopters attacked gunmen holed up inside high-rise buildings in Baghdad on Wednesday in what the US military said was an operation to regain control of a major street cutting through the heart of the city.
Thirty insurgents were killed and 35 detained during day-long gunbattles in the area, Iraq's Defence Ministry said. The US military said one US soldier had been killed in central Baghdad but would not confirm whether it was during the clashes.
US and Iraqi troops backed by Apache attack helicopters and armoured Stryker vehicles firing their heavy machine guns fought militants in Haifa Street in a battle that began around daybreak, US military spokesman Major Steven Lamb said.
He said US troops also fired mortars after coming under machinegun, mortar and rocket-propelled grenade attack during the operation to restore Iraqi security control of the Sunni insurgent stronghold, which lies within 2 km of the Green Zone, the heavily fortified compound housing Iraq's government.
"A lot has been coming from high-rise buildings. We are firing at terrorists in those buildings," Lamb told Reuters. He had no details on casualties, but a local resident said he had counted six bodies, all men, one of whom had a rifle lying next to him.
A local journalist said he helped transport 37 wounded people to hospital, including women and children, in three ambulances that managed to get through the security cordon. The US military said two US Marines were killed in combat on Tuesday in western Anbar region, heartland of the Sunni insurgency, where Bush plans to send 4,500 fresh troops.
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