BAGHDAD (AP) – A body recovered by Iraqi police from the Euphrates River south of Baghdad was identified as one of three American soldiers abducted in an ambush claimed by Al Qaeda, the military said Thursday.

Military officials told the family of Private first class Joseph Anzack Jr. that a commanding officer identified the remains recovered from the river, but that DNA tests were still pending.

“They told us, ‘We’re sorry to inform you the body we found has been identified as Joe,'” the soldier’s aunt, Debbie Anzack, said Wednesday. “I’m in disbelief.”

Anzack, 20, vanished along with the two others after their combat team was ambushed May 12 about 20 miles outside Baghdad. Five others, including an Iraqi, were killed in the ambush, subsequently claimed by al-Qaida.

“We can confirm that we have recovered the remains of Pfc. Anzack,” Lieutenant Colonel Josslyn Aberle, a military spokeswoman, said Thursday.

Colonel Aberle also denied reports that a second body had been found and was being examined to determine if it was that of a second missing soldier.

“The reports of a second set of remains being found is a false report,” she said.

Despite the recovery of Anzack’s body, thousands of American and Iraqi soldiers combed fields and searched homes south of Baghdad for a 13th day on Thursday, hoping to turn up clues about the soldiers.

“The search continues,” said Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Garver, an American military spokesman. The increase in American deaths and the discovery of the bodies come at a difficult moment for Washington, where the administration of President Bush and Congress are struggling to agree on funding for the unpopular war. The search for the captured soldiers has also taken thousands of troops out of the pool of forces for the Baghdad security crackdown.

Nationwide, deadly attacks continued Thursday as 20 were killed by the bombing of a funeral procession west of Baghdad, and six police officers were killed in northern Iraq.

At least 104 people were killed in sectarian violence or found dead Wednesday, including 32 who died in suicide bombings. One bombing took place 60 miles west of the capital, the other in a city to the east near the Iranian border.

In the search for American soldiers ambushed and captured May 12, thousands of American and Iraqi forces have trudged in temperatures above 110 degrees through desert and lush farmland, sometimes wading in sewage-polluted irrigation ditches.

Major General William Caldwell, the chief American military spokesman in Iraq, said the remains, later identified as those of Anzack, were recovered by Iraqi police.

Witnesses said police using civilian boats searched for other bodies on the river in Musayyib, about 40 miles south of Baghdad, and American troops intensified their presence on a nearby bridge as helicopters flew overhead, witnesses said.

Hassan al-Jibouri, 32, said he saw the body with head wounds and whip marks on its back floating on the river Wednesday morning. He and others then alerted police.

Members of the three soldiers’ platoon were crushed by reports that a body had been found.

“It just angers me that it’s just another friend I’ve got to lose and deal with, because I’ve already lost 13 friends since I’ve been here and I don’t know if I can take anymore of this,” said Specialist Daniel Seitz, 22, from Pensacola, Fla.

The military has warned that American casualties were likely to increase as troops made more frequent patrols during the American-led security crackdown in Baghdad, now in its fourth month.
The other missing soldiers are Specilaist Alex R. Jimenez, 25, and Private Byron W. Fouty, 19.

At Specialist Jimenez’s father’s home in Massachusetts, a yellow ribbon also was tied on the front door. Ramon Jimenez, who speaks Spanish, said through a translator in a cell phone conversation that he has been helped by the support of friends and family.

“The hope is very high that God is going to give Alex back to him,” said Wendy Luzon, a family friend who translated the conversation and has been serving as a spokeswoman.

Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, meanwhile, announced he was ready to fill six Cabinet seats vacated by politicians loyal to radical anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in a mass resignation last month.

Mr. al-Sadr, who went into hiding in Iran at the start of the Baghdad security crackdown, ordered his ministers to quit the government over Mr. al-Maliki’s refusal to call for a timetable for American withdrawal.

The military announced Thursday that two American soldiers were killed the day before while conducting combat operations in Iraq’s volatile Anbar Province. Those deaths, along with the deaths of nine other soldiers and Marines announced Wednesday, brought the American death toll for the month to at least 82. Last month, 104 American troops were killed in Iraq.

On Thursday, a parked car bomb targeting a funeral procession killed 20 people and wounded 35 others in the turbulent city of Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, medical officials said. The funeral was being held for a man killed Wednesday when militants broke into his restaurant and shot him.

Elsewhere, a roadside bomb attack in northern Iraq killed six police officers Thursday, Iraqi police said. The attack on the police convoy occurred about 8:30 a.m. in the Sulaiman Bek area about 75 miles south of the northern city of Kirkuk.

A suicide bombing Wednesday hit a cafe in the town of Mandali, on the Iranian border 60 miles east of Baghdad. The attacker walked into the packed cafe and blew himself up, killing 22 people and wounding 13, police said.

The cafe in the mixed Sunni, Shiite and Kurdish city was popular with police officers – but none was there at the time, police said. A man in his 30s wearing a heavy jacket despite the heat was seen walking into the cafe seconds before the blast, according to police.

In Washington, National Security Council spokesman Gordon Johndroe said American and Iraqi officials were planning to increase again the number of Iraqi security forces to help quell violence in the country.

The review was undertaken as Bush’s new military-political team in Iraq – commander General David Petraeus and American Ambassador Ryan Crocker – assessed strategy for the four-year-old war.

“Gen. Petraeus and Ambassador Crocker have been working on the specific tactics” needed for the strategy Bush announced in January – a troop buildup to calm Baghdad so Iraqis can make political and economic progress, Mr. Johndroe said.

About 337,000 Iraqi police and soldiers had been trained and equipped as of May 9, according to Defense Department statistics. Officials hope to have the currently planned 365,000 in place by the end of the year, Brigadier General Michael Jones, deputy director for political-military affairs in the Middle East for the Joint Chiefs of Staff, told lawmakers Tuesday.

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AP correspondents Maya Alleruzzo in Youssifiyah, Iraq, Lolita Baldor in Washington, Glen Johnson in Massachusetts, David Aguilar in Michigan and Jeremiah Marquez in California contributed to this report.