Bodies are Halliburton contractors



Residents and security forces began returning to Fallujah.
HOUSTON (AP) -- Three of four bodies found near an attack on a fuel convoy in Iraq earlier this month were contract workers for Halliburton Co., the company said today.
Stephen Hulett, 48, of Manistee, Mich.; Jack Montague, 52, of Pittsburg, Ill.; and Jeffery Parker, 45, of Lake Charles, La., "were brave hearts without medals, humanitarians without parades and heroes without statues," Houston-based Halliburton said in a statement confirming the identities of the workers.
Thomas Hamill of Macon, Miss., the Halliburton worker seen on video footage after the convoy attack, remained unaccounted-for.
Not identified
The fourth body has not been identified, Halliburton spokeswoman Wendy Hall said.
Hulett, Montague, Parker and Hamill were among seven employees of Halliburton subsidiary KBR, formerly known as Kellogg, Brown & amp; Root, missing since an April 9 attack on their convoy west of Baghdad. The bodies of Hulett, Montague, Parker and the unidentified victim were found near the site of the attack.
Two military men, Pfc. Keith M. Maupin and Sgt. Elmer C. Krause, also were unaccounted-for, and Maupin, like Hamill, has been seen on video footage.
"We grieve today for the tragic and sudden loss of our co-workers," the company said. "There is no road map for something like this and we are doing everything we can to assist the families as well as our employees to cope with this huge tragedy."
Returning to Fallujah
Elsewhere, Iraqi security forces and civilians who fled days of street fighting in Fallujah began to return today in a critical test of an agreement between U. S. officials and local leaders to end the American siege of the rebellious city.
Meanwhile, around 18 mortars hit a U.S.-run prison in Baghdad, killing more than 21 detainees, said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt. He could not say whether the victims had been detained for criminal activity or involvement in the anti-U.S. insurgency.
Kimmitt also acknowledged that U.S. soldiers shot and killed two Iraqis working for the U.S. funded al-Iraqiya television station a day earlier. He said the two had been filming a military checkpoint and drove toward it, failing to stop after repeated warning shots.
Correspondent Asaad Kadhim and driver Hussein Saleh were killed and cameraman Jassem Kamel was wounded "after American forces opened fire on them while they were performing their duty" near the city of Samarra, the station said.
A U.S. military-run radio station urged Fallujah residents to hand over heavy weapons -- including machine guns, grenade launchers and missiles -- to Iraqi security forces or at the mayor's office.
But it was not yet known whether guerrillas would abide by the call to surrender their arsenals. U.S. commanders have warned Marines might launch an all-out assault to take the city if the insurgents don't disarm.
By midday today, up to 200 members of the Iraqi security forces had returned to their jobs.
Lining up
Dozens more police -- wearing blue uniforms and flak jackets and carrying weapons -- lined up at a Marine checkpoint to enter the city in the afternoon. Iraqi families lined up there as well to go home.
As part of a deal announced Monday, the military agreed to let 50 families a day back into the city, but people kept showing up after that limit was reached.
Marines turned away about 150 people, said Capt. Ed Sullivan, and they asked them to come back Wednesday.
About a third of the city's 200,000 people fled in the two-week siege that killed at least 600 Iraqis, according to hospital officials.
Hamdi Rashid, a schoolteacher driving a minivan with 17 family members inside, was one of the Fallujans who made it back today.
"We love Fallujah," he said while waiting in line. "The Americans are doing good. They are going to arrest the bad men. We are looking for peace. We want to live in peace."
In the northern city of Mosul, a roadside bomb exploded as a U.S. military convoy passed, wounding five U.S. soldiers and three Iraqi civilians, Lt. Col. Joseph Piek said.
Meanwhile, U.S. and coalition military leaders were trying to work out how to fill the gap left by the abrupt decision by Spain and Honduras to withdraw their troops from the country.
Kimmitt said officials had been discussing how to replace the troops since Spanish Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero won parliamentary elections in mid-March -- days after the Madrid terror attacks -- on a pledge to bring Spanish troops home. Spain says its 1,300 troops will be pulled out within six weeks.
In a telephone call Monday, President Bush told Zapatero in a phone call he hoped it wouldn't give "false comfort to terrorists or enemies of freedom in Iraq."
Honduras announced a similar pullout late Monday. President Ricardo Maduro said his country's 370 troops would withdraw "in the shortest time possible."
Based at Najaf
Spanish and Honduran troops are mostly based in or around Najaf, where U.S. soldiers have been confronting the forces of an anti-American Shiite Muslim cleric, Muqtada al-Sadr.
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