Insurgents fire mortar at palace while Americans hand it over to Iraq

[sabra]

http://www.cbc.ca/cp/world/051122/w112222.html

Insurgents fire mortar at palace while Americans hand it over to Iraq


BAGHDAD (AP) - Insurgents fired a mortar at a U.S. ceremony attended by top officials on Tuesday to hand over a presidential palace in Saddam Hussein's hometown to local Iraqi authorities, sending the U.S. ambassador scrambling for cover but causing no injuries.

As a U.S. colonel was giving a speech, the mortar round fell about 300 metres away from the palace in Tikrit, 130 kilometres north of Baghdad, according to an Associated Press reporter at the scene.

U.S. Ambassador to Iraq Zalmay Khalilzad and the U.S. commander in Iraq, Gen. George Casey, briefly went inside the palace following the blast, but emerged a few minutes later to continue the ceremony.

Hamad Hamoud Shagtti, the Salahuddin provincial governor, did receive the keys to the palace from Casey and a deputy governor raised the Iraqi flag over the complex.

[cleofus1]

1. nothing to see here

move a long...move along

[xchrom]

2. they were flowers! -- they were throwing flowers!

the liberal media never reports the good stuff that goes on!

now you know those ambassadors had to be thinking -- ''fuck, there's the weapons of mass destruction!''

[harlinchi]

3. They've gone from IED's to mortars? When did that happen?

And what happened to our counter-fire ability? When I was in (just the reserves but I paid attention!), I thought our foes would be hard-pressed to use indirect fire against us since our ability to locate the shooters and return fire was superior.

What happened?

[thebigidea]

5. they've been using them since day one

its incredibly easy to set up, fire off a round or two, jump in a pickup, go somewhere else. Hard to find 'em, but also hard to actually get good accuracy.

[DoYouEverWonder]

6. They mortar the Green Zone

on a regular basis.

[harlinchi]

7. To #5 and #6: Oh yeah, I remember hearing 'bout them earlier.

It just seems like an escalation when actually it's from my poor memory.

[Media_Lies_Daily]

4. Khalilzad and Casey had to go inside to change their underwear.

[madmark]

8. what a clusterf*ck; can't even control the perimeter at the photo op.

[Javaman]

9. Oh just some fireworks for the celebration....n/t