Suicide bombers kill 35 in Iraq
Pastor Dale Morgan
Saturday March 24, 9:26 PM Reuters
*Suicide bombers kill 35 in Iraq*
By Ross Colvin
BAGHDAD (Reuters) - Suicide bombers struck in Baghdad and to the west
and south of the capital on Saturday in a string of attacks on mostly
Iraqi police targets that killed at least 35 people and wounded dozens,
most of them policemen.
In the worst attack, a man driving a lorry packed with explosives blew
up outside a police station in Baghdad's volatile southern district of
Dora, killing 20. The blast sent a large column of smoke into the air
and rattled windows kilometres away in the centre of the city.
Officers said the dead included 14 policemen and three detainees as well
as three others working in the building. Another 26 were wounded. The
blast caused major damage to the station, burying many victims in the
rubble.
Thousands of U.S. and Iraqi troops are sweeping through Baghdad in a
major operation to stem communal bloodshed. They have succeeded in
reducing the number of sectarian shootings, but curbing daily car
bombings has proven more difficult.
While U.S. and Iraqi forces are concentrating their efforts in Baghdad,
U.S. President George W. Bush is also sending more troops to the western
province of Anbar, where Sunni Arab insurgents are exacting a bloody
toll on Iraqi and U.S. forces.
The U.S. military said a soldier was killed in combat there on Friday.
A suicide car bomber struck a police station in the Qaim area of Anbar,
near the Syrian border, on Saturday while two others struck police
checkpoints at about the same time.
Dr Hamdi al-Alousi at Qaim hospital put the death toll from the attacks
at six with 17 people, mostly police, wounded. Anbar provincial police
said eight people had died and 20 wounded.
A suicide lorry bomber also struck near a Shi'ite mosque in the town of
Haswa about 60 km (40 miles) south of Baghdad, killing eight and
wounding 39, a police source said.
The spate of attacks came as U.S. and Iraqi troops sealed off the
Karrada district in the heart of Baghdad, stopping all vehicles and
pedestrians from entering the area as part of the security crackdown in
the capital.
At least one woman was arrested in Saturday's operation in Karrada after
about 20 weapons, including AK-47 rifles and belt -fed machineguns were
found in her house, an Iraqi army officer said, showing Reuters plastic
bags filled with the weapons.
The streets of Karrada, whose residents are mainly Shi'ite Muslims and
Christians and include several top politicians, were largely empty.
Convoys of Humvee armoured vehicles roamed the area, which is close to
the international Green Zone.
MINISTER RECOVERING
Salam al-Zobaie, the Sunni deputy prime minister, was said to be in a
good condition on Saturday after being operated on for wounds he
sustained in an attempted assassination attempt by a suicide bomber at a
prayer hall in his compound on Friday.
"His condition is very normal, thank God," said Alaa al- Zobaie, one of
his brothers. He dismissed reports that the bomber was one of Zobaie's
security guards.
Brigadier-General Qassim Moussawi, spokesman for security in Baghdad,
said on Saturday eight members of Zobaie's entourage were killed in the
attack. An aide to Zobaie said the dead included one of Zobaie's
brothers and a brother-in-law.
Police said 26 bodies were also found around Baghdad on Friday, all
apparent victims of sectarian hit squads.
There has been a sharp rise in the number of bodies found in Baghdad in
the last few days, although it is still not as high as the daily toll
that was regularly around 50 before the security crackdown started in
mid-February.
Bush is sending nearly 30,000 additional troops to Iraq, mostly to
support the security crackdown in Baghdad, despite growing opposition at
home to the unpopular war.
The U.S. House of Representatives on Friday voted to impose a September
1, 2008, deadline for withdrawing all American combat troops from Iraq,
prompting a quick promise of a veto from Bush.
Iraq's government stayed silent on a diplomatic row between Britain and
Iran over the seizure on Friday by Iranian forces of 15 British marines
and sailors in the Shatt al-Arab waterway that forms part of the
southern border between Iran and Iraq.
Iran says they entered Iranian waters illegally, while Britain says they
were conducting a routine search of ships in Iraqi waters. It has
demanded their immediate release.
(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim and Haider Salahaddin in
Baghdad, Tehran bureau)