Iraqi Army Post Destroyed By Bombs in Anbar Province

BAGHDAD, March 18 -- Insurgents disguised as mechanics slipped into car repair shops on the ground floor of a hotel used as an Iraqi army post in Anbar province, a hub of the Sunni insurgency, then furtively planted bombs before fleeing and blowing up the building on Sunday, police said.

Iraqi army and police forces also discovered the beheaded bodies of nine police officers in an abandoned post office east of Anbar's provincial capital, Ramadi, police Col. Tareq Aduleimi said. The bodies, found as the forces raided suspected hideouts of the insurgent group al-Qaeda in Iraq, showed signs of torture, he said.

The violence in the volatile Sunni-dominated province came on a day that the Iraqi military reported the details of a raid this month on a Sunni legislator's home, where officials said soldiers seized 65 Kalashnikov rifles and found traces of explosives on four cars.

Seven people were arrested in the March 8 raid at the home of Dhafir al-Ani, a lawmaker with the largest Sunni bloc in the Shiite-led parliament, Iraqi military spokesman Qassim al-Moussawi said at a news conference. One man, who had a sniper rifle, remains in custody, he said.

Reached by telephone, Ani called the raid "a humiliation attempt" but declined to place blame for it.

He said all his weapons were registered with the government and denied that his cars contained explosives. The vehicles frequently entered the fortified Green Zone, he said, where they were sniffed by police dogs. He said that those detained were his guards and that they had been tortured by the military.

While a security crackdown in Baghdad has brought relative calm to the capital, bloodshed has risen in surrounding provinces, including Anbar, where insurgents are clashing with U.S.-backed Sunni tribal chiefs for control. Hundreds of American troops have been killed in the province since the U.S.-led invasion four years ago.

The blasts on Sunday demolished Fallujah's al-Salam Hotel -- which means "peace hotel" in Arabic -- and killed or wounded at least 20 people, said Khaled al-Eulaimy, a lieutenant with the Fallujah police.

The U.S. military confirmed that a building in Fallujah was bombed but did not provide details.

In a statement posted on its Web site, the Islamic State of Iraq, a Sunni insurgent group, asserted responsibility for the bombing and said 25 Iraqi soldiers had been killed.

"Brave soldiers of the Islamic State of Iraq booby-trapped the building and the building was fully destroyed," the statement said. "With the help of God, all who were in it died."

At 7:20 a.m. Sunday, Eulaimy said, "a number" of insurgents wearing grease-stained clothing and toting tools entered the car repair shops on the ground floor of the three-story hotel. They used remote controls to detonate the hidden bombs, he said.