MADAIN, Iraq - Hundreds of Iraqi security forces, backed by U.S. military, swept into a town south of Baghdad at dawn Monday but found no hostages, despite reports that Sunni militants had kidnapped as many as 100 Shiites there. Residents and Sunni clerics said the reports had been grossly exaggerated by government officials bent on re-establishing control in the lawless region the U.S. military has called the "Triangle of Death" because it has become a stronghold of the Sunni insurgency.

Shia politicians in Iraq have called for Saddam Hussein to be executed if he is convicted of war crimes and say the president should resign if he will not approve the death penalty. Jalal Talabani, the incoming president of Iraq, said in an interview with the BBC that he would not sign the order of execution for Saddam.