US marines poised to storm Falluja, Ramadi

US marines prepared yesterday to storm the Iraqi cities of Falluja and Ramadi to crush Sunni Muslim insurgents and Arab fighters.

"We are gearing up for a major operation," Brigadier General Denis Hajlik told reporters at a base near Falluja. "If we do so, it will be decisive and we will whack them."

Mr Hajlik, deputy commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Force, said the expected assault would involve Iraqi forces.

Iraq's US-backed interim government has vowed to pacify the whole country before nationwide elections due in January.

US planes have launched almost daily air strikes on what the military says are safe houses used by a network of Iraqi and foreign fighters led by Jordanian Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.

But a full-scale US-led attack could be as devastating as a marine offensive in April that Washington called off after a world outcry over civilian casualties in Falluja. Local doctors reported more than 600 dead in the fighting.

Interim Prime Minister Iyad Allawi urged the people of Falluja on Thursday to hand over Zarqawi-led militants and seize a "last chance" for peace, but set no deadline.

Falluja leaders say they know nothing of Zarqawi's network. In on-off talks with the government, they have said Iraqi security forces can return to the city, but not US troops.

Marine Colonel Michael Shupp dismissed the sputtering dialogue as a sham. "The negotiations are a ruse. They are just stalling for time," he told reporters near Falluja.

US-led troops would have to support Iraqi forces inside Falluja after rebels were dislodged, he said. He ruled out any repeat of a peace deal in May which handed the city to a "Falluja Brigade" led by former Baathist army officers.

"The insurgents probably were the Falluja Brigade," Mr Shupp said.

Zarqawi's al Qaeda-allied group threatened on Tuesday to behead a Japanese hostage within 48 hours unless Tokyo withdrew its 550 non-combat troops from Iraq. Japan rejected the demand.

The deadline passed without any firm word on the fate of 24-year-old traveller Shosei Koda. Police said they had found the body of an unidentified Asian in Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's home town, on Thursday, but its description did not fit Mr Koda.

The US military said troops had taken possession of the unidentified remains, which were now at a military mortuary.

Zarqawi's network has beheaded several foreigners and claimed responsibility for many suicide bombings and attacks, including last week's killing of 49 unarmed Iraqi army cadets.

Marine intelligence officer Major James West said guerilla violence could continue even if the Jordanian was eliminated.

"Even if we get Zarqawi, that doesn't necessarily mean it's over," he told reporters.

West said Falluja's population had dropped to 50,000 or 60,000 from 350,000 because many families had fled for safety.

Falluja, 50 kilometres west of Baghdad, and Ramadi, 110 kilometres from the capital, have been cauldrons of anti-US insurgency since last year's war toppled Saddam Hussein.

A previously unknown Islamist group said on Thursday it had kidnapped a Polish-Iraqi woman and demanded that Poland take its troops out of Iraq. Warsaw said its contingent would stay.

Kidnappers in Iraq also hold a British-Iraqi woman, two French journalists and a score of other foreigners from a dozen countries. Some may be held for ransom, others as part of a campaign to drive foreign troops and workers from Iraq.

Gunmen killed the driver of a Turkish truck in the northern city of Mosul yesterday and set it ablaze, witnesses said. It was not immediately clear if the driver was a Turk, but the truck, carrying bottled water, had Turkish plates and markings.

A car bomb blew up near a US convoy in southern Mosul, killing an Iraqi civilian and wounding three, hospital staff said. The US military said two soldiers were slightly hurt.

Three American soldiers were wounded when a roadside bomb blast hit their Humvee vehicle on a highway between Mosul and Tel Afar 60 kilometres to the west, the military said.

Assassins killed Aqil Hamed al-Adeli, deputy governor of Diyala province, northeast of Baghdad, police said.

Gunmen shot dead two policemen in Latifiya, just south of Baghdad, as they were driving from Baghdad to their posts in the Shi'ite city of Kerbala, police in Kerbala said.