American troops shot and killed an Italian intelligence agent and wounded an Italian journalist Friday as they were en route to the Baghdad airport hours after the reporter was freed from a month-long hostage ordeal. The fatal shooting at a U.S. checkpoint marred what had been a day of celebration at the release of Giuliana Sgrena, who was kidnapped in Iraq last month while on assignment for the Rome-based newspaper Il Manifesto. American soldiers opened fire on the car taking Sgrena to safety just before 10 p.m. local time because the driver had approached the checkpoint “at a high rate of speed,” according to a U.S. military statement. In political developments, two members of Iraq’s powerful Shiite Muslim alliance withdrew Friday and others threatened to follow as tempers flared over the delay in forming a new government a month after landmark elections. Full Story
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