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Iraq hospital 'damaged by US raid'
At least 28 people have been wounded after a hospital in Baghdad's Sadr City district, a stronghold of Shia leader Muqtada al-Sadr, was damaged in what witnesses described as a US air strike.
A medic at the al-Sadr hospital said women and children were among the wounded in the raid, which an Iraqi security official said took place at around 10am local time (0700 GMT) on Saturday.
The US military confirmed the attack but said it targeted "known criminal elements".
"I can confirm that we conducted a strike in Sadr City this morning. The targets were known criminal elements. Battle damage assessment is currently ongoing," a US military spokesman said.
Witnesses said the target of the air raid, in which US forces fired several missiles, was a small house adjacent to the al-Sadr hospital and used as a rest area by Shia pilgrims.
The impact of the attack damaged more than a dozen ambulances belonging to the hospital, one of the three main medical facilities in the district, and shattered the windows of the building.
Fighters killed
Elsewhere, US soldiers killed 14 suspected Shia fighters and an American soldier was killed in a roadside bomb attack in the latest clashes in Baghdad, the US military said on Saturday.
Another 100 people were wounded in clashes on Friday and Saturday in Sadr City, Iraqi health officials said.
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The US military confirmed the attack but said it targeted "known criminal elements".
"I can confirm that we conducted a strike in Sadr City this morning. The targets were known criminal elements. Battle damage assessment is currently ongoing," a US military spokesman said.
Witnesses said the target of the air raid, in which US forces fired several missiles, was a small house adjacent to the al-Sadr hospital and used as a rest area by Shia pilgrims.
The impact of the attack damaged more than a dozen ambulances belonging to the hospital, one of the three main medical facilities in the district, and shattered the windows of the building.
Fighters killed
Elsewhere, US soldiers killed 14 suspected Shia fighters and an American soldier was killed in a roadside bomb attack in the latest clashes in Baghdad, the US military said on Saturday.
Another 100 people were wounded in clashes on Friday and Saturday in Sadr City, Iraqi health officials said.
More
For more information:
http://english.aljazeera.net/NR/exeres/86D...
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The missiles that hit close to the Sadr General Hospital were American. After a night of clashes in the neighborhood, the Americans fired at least three “precision-guided munitions” at the small building next door to the hospital. Neighbors said the building was used as a place of prayer for pilgrims, hospital employees and neighborhood residents, but the military identified it as a command center for the Shiite militias that it is battling.
Twenty-eight people were wounded in the strikes on the building and surrounding area, said Abdul Hussain Qassim, a hospital official.
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"I was hit by an American helicopter," Ahmed Yahya said. "I was with a group of about 10 children who were collecting empty soft drink cans in Jamila. We haven't done anything."
U.S. military officials confirmed firing two Hellfire missiles at a rooftop in the vicinity about the same time that the boy said the attack took place. However, they say the only damage U.S. forces saw was to the rooftop.
Another boy said his brother died in the attack.
Dr. Jawad al-Mousawi, chief doctor at Imam Ali hospital in Sadr City, said the hospital received the bodies of three boys and a wounded boy about 2 p.m. He said the hospital saw three other fatalities and treated 23 wounded people from airstrikes and fighting across the city.
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http://www.cnn.com/2008/WORLD/meast/05/03/iraq.main/index.html