8 wanted persons arrested, cache seized in Diala

DIALA / IraqiNews.com: Diala police forces arrested eight wanted men and seized an arms cache in separate areas of Baaquba district, the Diala police chief said on Sunday. “Forces from the Diala police department conducted an operation that targeted a number of wanted persons in different areas of the city of Baaquba, resulting in capturing eight,” Maj. General Abdelhussein al-Shimari told IraqiNews.com. “The forces also seized an arms cache in Buhrez district, (5 km) south of Baaquba, that contained eight Katyusha rockets and several home-made improvised explosive devices,” Shimari added. Diala province, a mix of Sunnis and Shiites, extends to the northeast of Baghdad as far as the Iranian borders. Its capital is Baaquba, 57 km northeast of Baghdad. It covers an area of 17,685 square kilometers (6,828 sq mi). In January 2008 Operation Phantom Phoenix was launched in an attempt to eradicate the remnants of al-Qaeda network following the Diala province campaign between 2006 and 2007. Later on, the Iraqi security forces had launched a wide-scale security campaign in Diala province. The operation, codenamed Bashaer al-Kheir (Promise of Good), is aimed at tracking down members of al-Qaeda network in Diala, Iraq’s most restive city, after the armed group lost its strongholds in the western Iraq predominantly Sunni province of al-Anbar, where tribesmen fought its members and flushed them out of the city. AmR (S) 1