Mosul - A young Iraqi girl watched her mother die of gunshot wounds in the northern city of Mosul on Thursday, police said.

The girl, who was also wounded, and her mother became the latest in a string of casualties in the city when unidentified gunmen opened fire on a street in western Mosul, roughly 400 kilometres north of Baghdad. It was unclear whether the two were the intended target.

Baghdad - A leading politician from the Iraqi Islamic Party, part of in Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki's ruling coalition, has been assassinated west of Baghdad, the party announced Thursday.

Faisal Abdallah al-Samrai was among the top leaders of the Iraqi Islamic Party, a descendant of the Iraqi branch of the Muslim Brotherhood and part of al-Maliki's United Iraqi Alliance.

Washington  - Six years into the war in Iraq a weary American public finally has an end to the US role in sight, but that end will take a couple more years and require more sacrifices by US soldiers.

Beginning with pre-dawn bombing on March 20, 2003, over Baghdad, the war was launched with the stated goal of ousting Saddam Hussein's regime and wiping out his weapons of mass destruction, which proved nonexistent. The mission evolved into stabilizing Iraq under a democratic government.

Baghdad - When Arab League Secretary General Amr Moussa visited US-controlled Iraq for the first time in 2005, most of the talk was about "not giving up on Iraq as an Arab country."

At that time, many Sunni Arab countries, particularly those allied with the United States, feared a disintegrating Iraq - with its majority Shiite population - would fall under the shadow of an interventionist, revolutionary Shiite Iran, and that the Arab world would be powerless to prevent it.

Ankara - Iraqi President Jalal Talabani has called on Turkey to announce an amnesty for Kurdish separatists, saying this was the best way to end three decades of fighting in south-east Turkey.

In an interview published in Sabah newspaper Wednesday, Talabani said he believed the Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK) was ready to lay down its arms and hand its weapons over to US forces in northern Iraq if a general amnesty was announced.

Baghdad  - Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa on Tuesday said he sees a "prosperous future" for Iraq.

"I feel that there is a big difference in the country since my last visit and the policy of reconciliation has led to increasingly stability," Mussa said.

He was speaking at a press conference in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, held jointly with Iraqi Prime Minsiter Nuri al-Maliki.

"Hope has emerged for a prosperous future," Mussa added.