Top-rank officers killed in Iraq ambush

At least 18 military servicemen were killed in an ambush in western Iraq on Saturday, including several top-ranking officers, security sources have told Al Jazeera.

The killings took place in the Huran valley of the Sunni Muslim-dominated province of Anbar, when a convoy of the Seventh army was hit by the members of the Al-Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq, according to sources.

The commander of the army division and his aid were among those killed in the attack.

Posts on online forums dominated by fighters called the slain commander, Mohammed Ahmed al-Kurwi, a "criminal" and celebrated the attack, which security sources described as carefully planned and executed.

The circumstances of Saturday's attack are disputed, with the Defense Ministry saying Kurwi, commander of the army's Seventh Division, and several other high-ranking officers were killed by a roadside bomb while pursuing fighters from an Al-Qaeda training camp in Anbar's desert.

But other military sources said the officers were killed when three suicide bombers wearing explosive belts detonated themselves among them in the western town of Rutba, 220 miles west of Baghdad.

"All that we know so far is three suicide bombers wearing explosive vests came from nowhere and detonated themselves among the officers," a military officer who was at the scene told Reuters by phone.

Some security officials suggested informants may have lured the commanders to the area under the pretext of raiding the Al-Qaeda camp.

No specific group immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, but suicide bombing is the trademark of Al-Qaeda's Iraqi affiliate, which merged this year with counterparts in Syria to form the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIS).

The assistant commander of the Seventh Division, the commander of its 27th Brigade, and several other high-ranking officers were also among those killed in the attack, sources said. Another 32 soldiers were wounded.

Violence has been on the rise in Iraq since a deadly security offensive on a Sunni protest camp in a northern town in April.

Two years after U.S. troops withdrew from Iraq, violence is at its highest level since 2006-7, when strife between Sunnis and Shia Muslims killed tens of thousands of people.

At least 352 people have died in attacks across the country so far this month, according to an Associated Press news agency count.

Al Jazeera and wire services