By Xinhua
Baghdad : U.S. and Iraqi troops launched an operation in two areas in the volatile Diyala province on Monday, killing 15 suspected al-Qaida insurgents and captured 58 others, a provincial security source said.
Hundreds of Iraqi soldiers and policemen backed by U.S. troops stormed at dawn the two towns of Buhruz and Muradiyah south of Baquba, the capital city of Dayala, the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
The operation is part of what the U.S. military named “Operation Iron Harvest” launched by the U.S. and Iraqi troops last week targeting the strongholds of the Qaida in Iraq militants in the province, the source said.
Diyala province, which stretches from the eastern edges of Baghdad to the Iranian border, has long been the hot bed of the al-Qaida insurgents whom were driven from Baghdad by major U.S. and Iraqi security crackdown earlier last year.