Summary: A roadside bomb in eastern Afghanistan killed four NATO troops, while bombings and clashes elsewhere in the country killed 14 more people. … A suicide bomber in a police uniform detonated inside a police headquarters in southern Afghanistan, killing 11 people and wounding 29. … Iraq’s prime minister Nouri al-Maliki said any U.S. withdrawals “must be done with our approval” and in coordination with the Iraqi government. … The U.S. military confirmed that U.S. forces shot down an unmanned Iranian aircraft in Iraqi airspace. … At least 4,259 members of the U.S. military have died in the Iraq war.

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Summary: U.S. counterterrorism officials have raised concerns that an extremist group called al-Shabab is recruiting young men in Minnesota and elsewhere in the United States. Al-Shabab controls much of Somalia and wants to establish an Islamic state there. The FBI is investigating whether young Somali men are being radicalized in Minnesota and recruited to fight with terror groups in Somalia.

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Summary: A suicide bomber struck tribal leaders touring a market in a Sunni area west of Baghdad killing as many as 33 people in the second major attack in the capital area in two days. The horrific blast followed a suicide attack that killed 30 people outside the police training academy in eastern Baghdad. The two attacks raised fears that Sunni insurgents may be escalating operations even as the U.S. phases out its combat role in Iraq.

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Summary: A suicide bomber killed 32 people at the entrance of Baghdad’s main police academy in a chilling reminder of the nation’s still-shaky security. The blast — the second major attack to hit Iraq in three days and the deadliest to strike Baghdad in nearly a month — was a bloody reminder of the ability of insurgents to defy security improvements and stage dramatic attacks as the U.S. begins to draw down its forces.

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Summary: With the end of U.S. combat operations in Iraq in sight, the cost of leaving is now measured in financial, logistical, and — above all — political terms. The U.S. withdrawal from Iraq will cost hundreds of billions of dollars. … March 2009 update of key facts, figures, and statistics on Iraq since the war began in March 2003. … The Pentagon reports that up to 18 deaths of soldiers in February 2008 may have been suicides.

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Summary: President Barack Obama has won crucial backing for his Iraq military withdrawal plan from leading Congressional Republicans, including Senator John McCain and Ohio Rep. John A. Boehner, the House minority leader.

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Summary: Four U.S. soldiers and an Afghan civilian working for them were killed in southern Afghanistan when their vehicle struck a roadside bomb. … In the fourth such incident in the Mosul area in just over a year, two Iraqi policemen opened fire on U.S. soldiers visiting a police station, killing an American soldier and an Iraqi interpreter, wounding three Americans, and raising concerns about insurgent infiltration among the ranks of Iraqi police.

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Summary: Although the worst of the sectarian bloodshed and loss of American lives have ebbed in Iraq, U.S. service members continue to die in the 5-year war.

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Summary: Muntadhar al-Zeidi, the Iraqi reporter who hurled his shoes at George W. Bush, said at his trial that President Bush’s smile as he talked about achievements in Iraq had made him think of “the killing of more than a million Iraqis, the disrespect for the sanctity of the mosques and houses, the rapes of women,” and enraged him. Al-Zeidi added: “After more than a million Iraqis killed, after all the economic and social destruction … I felt that this person is the killer of the people, the prime murderer. I was enraged and threw my shoes at him.”

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Summary: In the deadliest attack in Iraq so far this year, a female suicide bomber struck a tent filled with women and children resting during a pilgrimage south of Baghdad, killing 40 people and wounding about 80 in the deadliest of three straight days of attacks against Shiite worshippers.

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