Two suicide car bombers struck within a minute of each other and just a kilometer apart in south Baghdad shortly before noon yesterday, killing at least seven policemen and raising the day's bombing death toll in the capital to at least 31, police said.
Earlier yesterday, the day's first suicide car bombing killed sixteen policemen and five civilians in the same neighborhood, signaling a new round of bomb violence one day after residents suffered Baghdad's bloodiest day of the war.
Three civilians were killed when a roadside bomb struck a Ministry of Industry bus in eastern Baghdad. Thirteen were injured in the attack, said police Lieutenant Colonel Ahmed Abbod.
PHOTO: AP
The US military and Iraqi police drove through Baghdad's Dora neighborhood, where the bombings were concentrated yesterday, warning residents to stay indoors because five more car bombers were said to be ready to attack, police Captain Ali Abdul Hamza said. Streets in the southern neighborhood were abandoned.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq said it launched the Wednesday attacks. There was no immediate claim for yesterday's bombings.
Al-Qaeda's leader in Iraq, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, purportedly declared "all-out war" on Shiites, Iraqi troops and the government in an audiotape posted Wednesday on an Internet site known for carrying extremist Islamic content.
US forces and insurgents, meanwhile, reportedly clashed in the troubled western town of Ramadi, a militant stronghold on the main road to neighboring Jordan. A Web posting purportedly from al-Qaeda in Iraq said its forces had engaged the US military in the predominantly Sunni city of about 800,000.
On Wednesday, more than a dozen coordinated bombings ripped through Baghdad, killing 160 people and wounding 570. Many of the victims were day laborers lured by a suicide attacker posing as an employer.
In claiming it carried out the Wednesday attacks, al-Qaeda said it was taking retaliation for the rout of militants from their base in Tal Afar, the northern city near Syria.
The Thursday attacks in the capital began at 8am. Four hours later the twin bombing boomed out across Baghdad.
"There was just one minute and one kilometer between the two car bombs," said police Captain Firas Gaiti said. He said at least seven policemen died and 10 were wounded.
In the ethnically mixed city of Kirkuk, 290km north of Baghdad, insurgents detonated a roadside bomb next to a passing patrol, killing two police officers and wounding four, said Colonel Anwar Hassan.
The Legislative Yuan’s Finance Committee yesterday approved proposed amendments to the Amusement Tax Act (娛樂稅法) that would abolish taxes on films, cultural activities and competitive sporting events, retaining the fee only for dance halls and golf courses. The proposed changes would set the maximum tax rate for dance halls and golf courses at 50 and 20 percent respectively, with local governments authorized to suspend the levies. Article 2 of the act says that “amusement tax shall be levied on tickets sold or fees charged by amusement places, facilities or activities” in six categories: “Cinema; professional singing, story-telling, dancing, circus, magic show, acrobatics
Tainan, Taipei and New Taipei City recorded the highest fines nationwide for illegal accommodations in the first quarter of this year, with fines issued in the three cities each exceeding NT$7 million (US$220,639), Tourism Administration data showed. Among them, Taipei had the highest number of illegal short-term rental units, with 410. There were 3,280 legally registered hotels nationwide in the first quarter, down by 14 properties, or 0.43 percent, from a year earlier, likely indicating operators exiting the market, the agency said. However, the number of unregistered properties rose to 1,174, including 314 illegal hotels and 860 illegal short-term rental
INFLATION UP? The IMF said CPI would increase to 1.5 percent this year, while the DGBAS projected it would rise to 1.68 percent, with GDP per capita of US$44,181 The IMF projected Taiwan’s real GDP would grow 5.2 percent this year, up from its 2.1 percent outlook in January, despite fears of global economic disruptions sparked by the US-Iran conflict. Taiwan’s consumer price index (CPI) is projected to increase to 1.5 percent, while unemployment would be 3.4 percent, roughly in line with estimates for Asia as a whole, the international body wrote in its Global Economic Outlook Report published in the US on Monday. The figures are comparatively better than the IMF outlook for the rest of the world, which pegged real GDP growth at 3.1 percent, down from 3.3 percent
ECONOMIC COERCION: Such actions are often inconsistently applied, sometimes resumed, and sometimes just halted, the Presidential Office spokeswoman said The government backs healthy and orderly cross-strait exchanges, but such arrangements should not be made with political conditions attached and never be used as leverage for political maneuvering or partisan agendas, Presidential Office spokeswoman Karen Kuo (郭雅慧) said yesterday. Kuo made the remarks after China earlier in the day announced 10 new “incentive measures” for Taiwan, following a landmark meeting between Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) and Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) in Beijing on Friday. The measures, unveiled by China’s Xinhua news agency, include plans to resume individual travel by residents of Shanghai and China’s Fujian
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