• Gunmen abducted a Lebanese-American contractor, Radim Sadeq, who worked with the U.S. Army, from his Baghdad home in the upscale neighborhood of Mansour, Iraqi officials said. It was the second abduction this week in Mansour, where many foreign companies are based.

• The Jordanian government said four Jordanian drivers have been kidnapped in Iraq and two others were shot at by unknown assailants in separate incidents.

• A U.S. soldier died and another was wounded when a roadside bomb exploded near Salman Pak, about 10 miles southeast of Baghdad, the U.S. military says.

• A car bomber detonated his vehicle at an airport checkpoint in Baghdad, injuring nine people but no Americans, U.S. military and hospital officials said.

• Gunmen killed a senior Oil Ministry official, Hussein Ali al-Fattal, after he left his house in the Yarmouk district of western Baghdad.

• Al-Jazeera television broadcast a threat by an unspecified armed group to strike oil installations and government buildings if the Americans launch an all-out assault on Fallujah.

• A militant group, the Ansar al-Sunnah Army, posted a videotape on a Web site showing the beheading of man it said was an Iraqi army major who confessed to taking part in attacks against insurgents on orders of the Americans.

• In another video, aired on Al-Jazeera, a previously unknown group said it beheaded three Iraqi National Guardsmen, accusing them of spying for the Americans.

• In Samarra, 60 miles north of Baghdad, residents said U.S. soldiers clashed with gunmen in the city center. Four Iraqis were killed and two injured, said Ahmed Jadour of the Samarra General Hospital.

A statement distributed in Samarra warned Iraqis against turning in weapons to the Americans.

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