Four Italians kidnapped in Iraq

An Islamist group holding four Italians demanded Italy pull its troops out of Iraq, after other kidnappers freed five Ukrainians and three Russians yesterday in the latest spin of the hostage carousel.

The past week's kidnappings have lent a new dimension to the Iraq conflict, snaring civilians from a dozen countries, some of which, like Russia, opposed the war that ousted Saddam Hussein.

Television pictures showed four men described as Italian hostages seated on the ground holding their passports. Heavily armed men stood around them.

Italy's Foreign Ministry confirmed four Italians were missing and said they worked for a security company. Insurgents said last week they had captured four Italians.

The Ukrainians and Russians were freed a day after they were seized in Iraq, where a US military crackdown has led to the abduction of over 40 foreigners and a flareup of violence.

But Russia's biggest contractor in Iraq said it was now evacuating all its 370 staff and Moscow said it was ready to help all the roughly 500 Russians in Iraq leave the country.

France also urged its citizens to leave Iraq and postpone any plans to travel there.

Seven Chinese seized separately near Falluja were freed on Monday and three Czech journalists were missing. The fate of three Japanese hostages remained unclear.

While fighting erupted around the flashpoint Sunni Muslim town of Falluja, US forces kept up pressure on hardline Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr detaining one of his aides in a Baghdad hotel and taking him away in an armoured vehicle.

US forces released Hazem al-Araji after five hours saying he had no direct part in recent violence by Sadr's militia.

Sadr's Mehdi Army militia staged an uprising across the south last week, posing a new challenge to US-led forces struggling to crush a Sunni insurgency in central Iraq.

Sadr said in a television interview he was willing to sacrifice his life, but urged his followers to keep up the struggle against the US-led occupation, even if he was killed.

The US military said on Monday it would kill or capture Sadr, who is believed to be in Najaf, a city holy to Shi'ites.

But a delegation representing senior Shi'ite clerics who met Sadr said he had hinted he would disband his militia if religious authorities instructed him to do so.

Fresh clashes on the eastern edge of Falluja also threatened a shaky truce in the city, the scene of fierce fighting last week between US Marines and Sunni insurgents. Residents said tanks were firing in two districts of the battered city.

A US helicopter was shot down near the town, witnesses said. The US military said three of the crew were wounded and it later destroyed the helicopter.

Fighting also broke out in al-Karma, near Falluja, and a Reuters photographer saw smoke billowing from the town after US air strikes. A US truck was blazing nearby. Locals said two women and three men had been killed in the fighting.

One building was reduced to mounds of smouldering concrete and twisted metal after the strikes.

Insurgents, their faces concealed by red-and-white keffiyeh scarves, emerged from muddy side streets and date palm groves with rocket-propelled grenades slung over their shoulders.

"These cowards, the Americans, they are killing families. They did not come here to liberate us from the (Saddam) regime, they came to kill women and children," said one guerilla.

"We will teach them a lesson, we will turn this city into a graveyard for them."

The US army said a roadside bomb attack on a convoy killed a US soldier and wounded another soldier and a civilian contractor. The convoy was travelling from Baquba to Najaf.

Three mortar rounds hit Baghdad. One landed in a street, killing an Iraqi. Another sent smoke rising from the main US compound, but a military spokesman had no word on casualties.

The attack jangled nerves in a city already shaken by Iraq's bloodiest days since the fall of Saddam a year ago.

Ahmed al-Ani, an official at Falluja's main hospital, said more than 625 people had died in the fighting there, including about 20 killed in the past three days of sporadic gunfire.

The Marines attacked rebels in Falluja last week in response to the murder and mutilation of four American private security guards ambushed in the town on March 31.

In Samarra, north of Baghdad, Reuters television footage showed a heavily damaged mosque. Locals said US forces had shelled it after coming under fire from insurgents on Monday.

Faced with spreading violence in Iraq, General John Abizaid, commander of US forces in the region, said he wanted two more brigades to join the 145,000 US-led troops already there.

US President George W. Bush said the drive to crush "lawlessness and gangs" was vital for a planned handover of power to Iraqis on June 30 and a transition to democracy.