BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq's Prime Minister Iyad Allawi declared that Saddam Hussein will be

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) -- Iraq's Prime Minister Iyad Allawi declared that Saddam Hussein will be transferred to Iraqi legal custody Wednesday and will face charges before an Iraqi court the next day.
Allawi promised an open proceeding when Saddam faces war crimes charges, including genocide. Eleven other "high-value detainees" also are expected to face justice, he told reporters during his first news conference since the U.S.-led coalition returned sovereignty to his government Monday.
"I know I speak for my fellow countrymen when I say I look forward to the day former regime leaders face justice," he said.
However, the trials for Saddam and 11 others will not occur for months, and he urged the Iraqi people to be patient. He acknowledged that more than 1 million Iraqis are missing as a result of events that occurred during the former regime -- and that many Iraqis want justice done.
But he insisted that Saddam must receive a "just trial, a fair trial."
"We would like to show the world that the new Iraq government means business and wants to do business and wants to stabilize Iraq and put it on the road toward democracy and peace," Allawi said. "We want to put this bad history behind us and move toward a spirit of national unity and reconciliation in the future."
The former Iraqi leader will remain in a U.S.-run jail because the Iraqi government lacks a suitable prison.
American casualties
Elsewhere in Iraq, a roadside bomb rocked a military convoy in southeast Baghdad today and killed three U.S. troops, an Iraqi national guardsman said, in the first major attack on American forces since they transferred sovereignty in Iraq to an interim government.
Footage from Associated Press Television News showed blood inside a slightly damaged humvee and a flak vest laying in the road in the residential neighborhood.
Iraqi national guardsman Sgt. Ali Muhsin said that three U.S. service members were killed and at least one wounded by the roadside bomb. The U.S. military in Iraq later released a statement confirming that three U.S. Marines were killed and two were wounded.
Army Maj. Phil Smith of the 1st Cavalry Division said he thinks the attack involved U.S. Marines. A U.S. soldier at the scene said the bomb hit the lead vehicle in the convoy and wounded or killed several American soldiers.
Hostage execution
Meanwhile, Iraqi militants shot dead an American soldier they had held hostage for three months, saying the killing was because of U.S. policy in the Mideast nation, Al-Jazeera television said today.
The Arab-language station reported that the slain soldier was Spc. Keith M. Maupin, but the U.S. military said it could not confirm whether a man shown being shot in a murky videotape was indeed Maupin, who was taken hostage after an April 9 attack outside Baghdad. The report did not say when Maupin, 20, of Batavia, Ohio, was killed.
In a separate hostage drama, an Iraqi extremist group freed three Turkish captives today, Turkey's foreign minister said. Al-Jazeera television reported that the group was releasing the hostages "for the sake of their Muslim brothers."
"Our citizens have been released," Foreign Minister Abdullah Gul told state television. "We've struggled a lot for their release."
The Arab satellite station broadcast a videotape showing the three Turkish hostages, believed to have been contractors, kneeling in front of three members of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's Tawhid and Jihad movement, as one of the militants read a statement.
"For the sake of you, our brothers, and Muslims of the people of Turkey ... we will release these hostages and send them safely home," the statement said.
Shot on video
Al-Jazeera aired a video showing a blindfolded man identified as Maupin sitting on the ground. Al-Jazeera said that in the next scene, gunmen shoot the man in the back of the head, in front of a hole dug in the ground. The station did not broadcast the killing.
Maj. Willie Harris, spokesman for the Army's 88th Regional Readiness Command, said that the man in the footage could not be clearly identified but that the videotape is being analyzed by the Department of Defense.
"There is no confirmation at this time, that the tape contains footage of Matt Maupin or any other Army soldier," he said.
Al-Jazeera said a statement was issued with the video in the name of a group calling itself "The Sharp Sword against the Enemies of God and His Prophet."
In the statement, the militants said they killed the soldier because the United States did not change its policies in Iraq and to avenge "martyrs" in Iraq, Saudi Arabia and Algeria.
Other Americans
Maupin was among nine Americans, seven of them contractors, who disappeared after an ambush on a convoy west of Baghdad on April 9.
The bodies of four civilian employees of Kellogg Brown & amp; Root -- a subsidiary of Vice President Dick Cheney's former company Halliburton -- were later found in a shallow grave near the site of the attack. The body of Sgt. Elmer Krause, of Greensboro, North Carolina, was later found.
One civilian driver, Thomas Hamill of Macon, Miss., was kidnapped but escaped from his captors nearly a month later. The others are missing.
Maupin's family declined any public statement. Maj. Mark Magalski, an Army officer assigned to support the family, said the family might have something to say today if military officials released details of the videotape.
Yellow ribbons have been in place for weeks on utility poles, signs and at businesses near Maupin's home, about 15 miles east of Cincinnati. Residents and community leaders have convened a series of rallies in a park and at the Clermont County Courthouse to show support for Maupin's family.
Drivers in a caravan of about 10 cars displaying yellow ribbons honked their horns and passengers waved American flags out of the windows as they moved past Maupin's mother's house Monday night. Police kept reporters away, saying the family wanted to be left alone.
The family chose to be cautious and say nothing because it has struggled with conflicting reports before about Maupin's safety, Army officers said.
Vigil in the rain
About 200 people held a vigil for Maupin in the rain early Monday night in Batavia.
"I was real impressed when I saw the folks gathering out in the pouring rain," said Dan Haglage, of Batavia. "That's quite a commitment to him and his family."
Haglage said the community has come together to support the family.
"I think everybody shares the sorrow of his parents and what they've had to go through the last couple of months," Haglage said.