Mortar attack wounds Iraqi guards
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Eight Iraqi National Guard members have been wounded in a mortar attack on their base in Baghdad, police said.
Police said five mortars landed on the base in the al-Waziriya neighborhood of the capital on Thursday. They declined to say whether any of those critically wounded later died.
In a separate incident, Interior Ministry official Col. Mohammed Abdul Rahman was wounded in a drive-by shooting in Baghdad Thursday morning. He was in critical but stable condition at Yarmouk Hospital.
A Task Force Baghdad soldier was also wounded by a roadside bomb Thursday, the U.S. military said. The incident took place at 2 p.m. in Baghdad. The soldier was taken to a military medical treatment facility.
Elsewhere in Iraq, a car bomb detonated Thursday morning in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul, seriously wounding at least one civilian, according to eyewitnesses and the U.S. military.
The military said no Multi-National Forces were in the area at the time of the attack, despite eyewitness accounts of a U.S. military patrol near the scene.
The attack happened at about 11 a.m. (0800 GMT) near the Mosul Cultural Center.
The attacks came one day after Iraq's interim president said he saw no reason why the insurgency should not be vanquished within a year and Iraq well on its way towards becoming a constitutional democracy.
"Why not?" Ghazi al-Yawar told CNN's Wolf Blitzer on Wednesday. "We're not fighting a Viet Cong which has principles and popular support. We are fighting Saddam loyalists ... they know they are fighting for a losing battle. The whole Iraqi population is against them. I'm sick and tired of them.
"I think one year from now, exactly, we'll be very busy preparing for our free democratic election after we have a constitution."
Although al-Yawar acknowledged that some of Iraq's neighbors were not being helpful, he expressed the belief that neighboring Iranians would not interfere with next month's planned elections in Iraq in an attempt to create another Islamic regime.
Al-Yawar also said he foresaw U.S. forces remaining in Iraq until enough Iraqi forces had been recruited and trained to replace them.
Meanwhile the Japanese government extended its troop mission in Iraq by another year.
"We must not give in to terror," Prime Minister Junichiro Koizumi said. "The Iraqis are trying to build a government with their own hands. We must support this. The Self-Defense Forces are needed for this end."
The Cabinet okayed the plan and the government then approved it. The mission was to expire next week.
The 550-troop humanitarian mission, based in Samawa in southern Iraq, is Japan's largest overseas military operation since the end of World War II.
The mission is unpopular, according to polls, which show that the majority of citizens want the troops to be brought back home immediately.
CNN Producer Ayman Mohyeldin and Correspondent Atika Shubert contributed to this report.
