U.S. Troops Kill Iraqi Teenager, Wound 4 Wedding Guests

An Agence France-Presse (AFP) correspondent said American soldiers opened fire when their convoy drove near a house where a wedding was under way and shots were being fired in the air in celebration in Fallujah, 50 kilometers (30 miles) west of Baghdad.

Fourteen-year-old Sufian Daoud was shot dead and four people, including two women, were wounded, in the incident, which happened at 11:00 pm Wednesday, September 17, witnesses also said.

The wounded were transferred to hospital in the town. Two cars were also damaged in the shooting.

The trigger-happy American soldiers, apparently thinking they were the target of the celebratory fire, shot in the direction of both the people taking part in the wedding and passers-by.

A U.S. military spokesman in Baghdad said there was no immediate information available on the report.

Witnesses said Thursday, September 18, that dozens of people were milling in the streets of Fallujah, where a funeral procession for Daoud was getting underway and firing gun shots into the air as mourners marched by.

Cars formed a convoy and the casket was passed along the shoulders of mourners as the procession made its way towards a nearby cemetery, passing well-armed angry residents.

U.S. occupation forces regularly come under resistance attacks in Fallujah, where unprovoked harassments have gained the occupation forces much unpopularity among the residents.

On Saturday, September 13, the U.S. military issued an ‘apology’ after nine security guards from Fallujah were killed the previous day when U.S. troops opened fire as the guards were chasing thieves.

The next day one American soldier was killed and another three were wounded in Fallujah when their convoy was hit by a roadside bomb.

The area around Fallujah has earned a reputation, and been dubbed by locals as the "triangle of death" for the occupation forces.

That triangle links Fallujah, Khaldiyah and Ramadi, and the Habbaniyah Lake, where attacks on U.S. convoys are frequent.

In the town, flyers have sprouted warning drivers to stay away from U.S. convoys.

"We have warned drivers that we cannot be responsible for their lives if they don’t heed these warnings," a policemen, who asked not to be named, told AFP recently.