World Scene

Defense contractor insurance questioned

A poorly run Pentagon program for providing worker”s compensation for civilian employees in Iraq and Afghan-istan has allowed defense contractors and insurance companies to gouge American taxpayers, a House oversight committee said yesterday.

Insurance companies alone have pocketed $600 million in excessive profits in the past five years, according to a staff report from the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, but the Defense Department refuses to adjust its approach for managing the program.

According to the committee, the Pentagon allows its contractors to negotiate their own insurance contracts. By contrast, the State Department, U.S. Agency for International Development and the Army Corps of Engineers have all selected a single insurance carrier to provide the insurance at fixed rates.

IRAQ

Troops hunt down terrorists in Mosul

BAGHDAD — Government troops began house-to-house searches for al Qaeda in Iraq militants in Mosul yesterday, part of a major security operation to cleanse Iraq’s third-largest city of cells of the terror network.

Described by the U.S. military as the last major urban base of al Qaeda in Iraq, Mosul has become the site of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s third security drive in two months as he attempts to defeat Shi”ite militants and Sunni extremists.

Mr. al-Maliki flew to Mosul on Wednesday to take charge of the operation by U.S.-backed Iraqi forces. Yesterday, he sought to enlist the support of former Saddam Hussein-era army officers and local tribal leaders in two meetings in Mosul.

AFGHANISTAN

Suicide bomber uses burqa disguise

KABUL — A suicide bomber wearing a burqa attacked a police patrol at a crowded market in western Afghanistan yesterday, killing at least 12 people and wounding 27 others, officials said.

Provincial Gov. Rohul Amin said the bomber, who struck a busy market in the Dilaram district of Farah province, was a woman. But the Taliban, which took responsibility for the blast, identified the bomber as a man named Mullah Khalid.

Five policemen, including a district police chief, and seven civilians were killed, Mr. Amin said. Twenty-seven people — 11 police and 16 civilians — were wounded, he said.

ZIMBABWE

Government sets new election date

HARARE — The presidential runoff between President Robert Mugabe and opposition leader Morgan Tsvangirai will be held by July 31 — three months after the first-round results were announced, state media reported yesterday.

An official government notice issued late Wednesday announced that Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa had exercised his right to extend the runoff period of 21 days to 90 days, according to the Herald newspaper, a government mouthpiece.

Mr. Tsvangirai’s opposition Movement for Democratic Change party has protested any extension, calling it a violation of election laws. The MDC and rights groups have accused Mr. Mugabe — Zimbabwe’s leader for 27 years — of hunting down and torturing its members so they will be too afraid to vote.

From wire dispatches and staff reports