Iraq

ARBIL, Iraq (AFP) - Iraq's autonomous Kurdistan region has called in international consultants to fight corruption and to restructure its administration, Prime Minister Neshirvan Barzani said on Monday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. ambassador to Iraq Christopher Hill was unhurt when a roadside bomb blasted his convoy in the south of the country, USA Today reported on Monday.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Iraqi Americans Wasan Alqaisi and Sumer Majid made a Fourth of July family picnic of kebab -- served on hamburger buns with slices of American cheese.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - At least four people were killed on Sunday and 32 were wounded in a wave of bomb attacks targeting churches in Baghdad, a security official said.

As of Sunday, July 12, 2009, at least 4,323 members of the U.S. military had died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

BAGHDAD - A car bomb exploded near a church as worshippers left Sunday Mass, killing at least four civilians and injuring 18 in one of several attacks on Iraq's beleaguered Christian minority.

WASHINGTON - U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Christopher Hill was among a group of American personnel who were uninjured when an explosive device detonated near their convoy in southern Iraq.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Iraqi forces have not called for U.S. help in urban combat since June 30, when U.S. combat troops withdrew from city and town centers under a bilateral security agreement, a senior U.S. official said.

BAGHDAD - Below-average rainfall and insufficient water in the Euphrates and Tigris rivers have left Iraq bone dry for a second straight year, wrecking swaths of farm land, threatening drinking water supplies and intensifying fierce sandstorms that have coated the country in brown dust.

TEHRAN, Iran - Five Iranian officials held in Iraq for more than two years by U.S. forces returned home Sunday after the U.S. released them under pressure from the Iraqi government.

TEHRAN (AFP) - Five Iranian diplomats who were freed by the US military in Iraq last week after 30 months in detention arrived back home to a hero's welcome in Tehran on Sunday.

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The U.S. military sentenced a soldier to three years in a military jail Saturday for the accidental shooting death of a fellow soldier serving in Iraq.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Seven people were killed and 66 wounded on Saturday in attacks in Iraq, including bombings at a central Baghdad billiards cafe, security officials said.

BAGHDAD - The U.S. military in Iraq has sentenced a soldier to three years in jail in the shooting death of another soldier.

MOSUL, Iraq (Reuters) - A car bomb in a market killed at least four people and wounded 50 in the violent northern Iraqi city of Mosul on Saturday, police said.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - A truck driver was mistakenly killed by American forces outside the northern Iraqi city of Tikrit, the US army said on Saturday.

MOSUL, Iraq (AFP) - Four civilians were killed and 35 people injured on Saturday by a car bomb in a Shiite district in the restive Iraqi city of Mosul, a police officer told AFP.

BAGHDAD (AFP) - Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki on Saturday renewed a call for the Iraqi constitution to be changed to concentrate more power with the central government in Baghdad.