2 toddlers among 49 'criminals' killed

Baghdad: The US military said it had killed 49 "criminals" in clashes in the Baghdad district of Sadr City on Sunday in a raid to capture a militant suspected of involvement in the kidnapping of US soldiers in Iraq.

Reuters witnesses said US strikes had killed two toddlers in the poor district, the main stronghold in Baghdad for the Mehdi Army, a Shi'ite militia loyal to cleric Moqtada Al Sadr. Iraqi police said 13 people had been killed and 69 wounded.

The bodies of the toddlers, one in a nappy, lay on blankets in the morgue of Imam Ali hospital in Sadr City where doctors tended to wounded men, some elderly, and boys.