Kirkuk, Iraq News

The suspected mastermind of a suicide bombing which killed an Iraqi provincial counterterror chief has died in custody in what police said on Wednesday was an overnight suicide.

Thousands of dollars have been stolen from the largest bank in the Iraqi oil city of Kirkuk by men dressed as police.

An Army soldier from Cobb County died Friday in Iraq, the Department of Defense said Monday.

Kirkuk, Iraq - Robbers dressed as security personnel and claiming to be hunting a suicide bomber stole thousands of dollars from the Iraqi oil city of Kirkuk's largest bank on Monday, police and witnesses said.

Three Iraqi policemen were killed and four wounded by a bomb which targeted a patrol in the northern city of Kirkuk on Saturday, security officials said.

U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates poses for a photo with U.S. soldiers at an airbase near Kirkuk, north of Baghdad, Iraq on Dec.

Saturday, December 12, 2009 KIRKUK, Iraq: US intelligence shows militants linked to al-Qaeda and other groups have been fleeing South Waziristan in the face of a Pakistani military offensive, Defence Secretary Robert Gates said on Friday.

The United Nations refugee agency today called on all States to continue to refrain from forcibly returning Iraqi asylum-seekers to Baghdad, Kirkuk and other violence-prone areas in the centre of the country, warning that the situation was still too precarious due to continuing violence and serious human rights violations.

A A I want to thank all of you for coming today, although I suspect more than a few of are -- are volunteered for this duty today.

In a photo provided by the Dept. of Defense, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates talks with personal security detail members while waiting for a flight in Kabul, Afghanistan Wednesday, Dec.

"Gunmen killed four policemen at a checkpoint in Abu Ghraib. A cache containing TNT, cannon balls and other explosives was also found.

Today's coordinated car bombings in Baghdad rank among the most lethal terror attacks in Iraq since the 2003 invasion March 2 2004 Coordinated blasts from suicide bombers, mortars and planted explosives strike Shia Muslim shrines in Karbala and in Baghdad, killing at least 181 people.

Iraq's fractious Parliament agreed to a compromise paving the way for legislative elections early next year after an 11th-hour phone call from President Obama to a top Kurdish leader removed remaining objections to a deal.

Minutes before a midnight deadline to approve the amended law, lawmakers who had been arguing in conference rooms and around cafeteria tables voted in the Parliament chamber to approve an election law placed in jeopardy when it was vetoed by Iraq's Sunni vice president three weeks ago.

Iraqi lawmakers reached a minutes-to-midnight deal late Sunday, clearing a path to national elections early next year that are seen as crucial to a smooth U.S. troop withdrawal.

Reporting from Kirkuk, Iraq - Across a bleak desert landscape dotted with blazing oil fires on the northern edge of this ancient city, new houses are rising from the sands -- thousands of them in neat rows, mostly unfinished save for their gray cinder-block shells.

Four Iraqi police who had been deployed to guard shoppers and vendors at a vegetable market west of Baghdad were among six people killed on Sunday by unknown gunmen, government and security officials said.

Cover story Kurdistan: A lot of oil, a lot of risk Iraqi workers walk in South Rumaila oil field, in southern Iraq, December 2, 2009.

The soldiers of Battery B were on a routine walk through a downtown market when they heard the noise: a low crack that was followed by a plume of black smoke 500 yards away.

Mud-coated sandals belonging to Iraqi soldiers at an Iraqi Army base near Kirkuk.

In the run-up to the election, could Iraqi minds be concentrated strongly enough to find at least a temporary solution to an age-old and dangerous conundrum? AFP IT SOUNDS far-fetched but it may be true.