Car bombs have killed more than 110 people, 25 of them children, in a surge of violence in Iraq ahead of an Oct. 15 referendum on a new constitution.
One of the four car bombs ripped through a crowded market in the southern town of Hilla, killing at least 12 people and wounding 47 yesterday, officials said.
The vehicle was parked when it detonated at about 9:30am in the city 95km south of Baghdad.
As Iraqi police and soldiers sealed off the Al-Sharia vegetable market, emergency workers lifted wounded victims and dead bodies into ambulances from streets covered with pools of blood and shattered vegetable stands.
In the mainly Shiite town of Balad, north of Baghdad, the death toll from three huge car bombs on Thursday rose to 98 yesterday, hospital director Kassim Aboud said.
At least 119 others were injured.
Apparently aimed at killing a large number of Shiite civilians, the string of bombings started just before sunset on Thursday when the first blast ripped through an open-air market crowded with people buying vegetables. The next bomb exploded at a bank just meters away, followed by a third on a nearby street of clothing shops.
Most of the fatalities were civilians, though the wounded included the police chief and four officers, said the director of Balad hospital.
Furious Balad residents blamed the attacks on "foreign fighters," long accused by the US military of infiltrating Iraq from Syria to carry out attacks across the country.
"What have those Jordanians and Palestinians and Saudis got to do with us? Shame on them!" said Abu Waleed, a hotel owner who said seven people staying in his hotel died in the blasts.
Five US soldiers were also killed in a bombing near Ramadi, the US Army said on Thursday.
DEFENSE: The first set of three NASAMS that were previously purchased is expected to be delivered by the end of this year and deployed near the capital, sources said Taiwan plans to procure 28 more sets of M-142 High Mobility Artillery Rocket Systems (HIMARS), as well as nine additional sets of National Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS), military sources said yesterday. Taiwan had previously purchased 29 HIMARS launchers from the US and received the first 11 last year. Once the planned purchases are completed and delivered, Taiwan would have 57 sets of HIMARS. The army has also increased the number of MGM-140 Army Tactical Missile Systems (ATACMS) purchased from 64 to 84, the sources added. Each HIMARS launch pod can carry six Guided Multiple Launch Rocket Systems, capable of
Tropical Storm Podul strengthened into a typhoon at 8pm yesterday, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, with a sea warning to be issued late last night or early this morning. As of 8pm, the typhoon was 1,020km east of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, moving west at 23kph. The storm carried maximum sustained winds of 119kph and gusts reaching 155kph, the CWA said. Based on the tropical storm’s trajectory, a land warning could be issued any time from midday today, it added. CWA forecaster Chang Chun-yao (張竣堯) said Podul is a fast-moving storm that is forecast to bring its heaviest rainfall and strongest
TRAJECTORY: The severe tropical storm is predicted to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday and Thursday, and would influence the nation to varying degrees, a forecaster said The Central Weather Administration (CWA) yesterday said it would likely issue a sea warning for Tropical Storm Podul tomorrow morning and a land warning that evening at the earliest. CWA forecaster Lin Ting-yi (林定宜) said the severe tropical storm is predicted to be closest to Taiwan on Wednesday and Thursday. As of 2pm yesterday, the storm was moving west at 21kph and packing sustained winds of 108kph and gusts of up to 136.8kph, the CWA said. Lin said that the tropical storm was about 1,710km east of Oluanpi (鵝鑾鼻), Taiwan’s southernmost tip, with two possible trajectories over the next one
GET TO SAFETY: Authorities were scrambling to evacuate nearly 700 people in Hualien County to prepare for overflow from a natural dam formed by a previous typhoon Typhoon Podul yesterday intensified and accelerated as it neared Taiwan, with the impact expected to be felt overnight, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said, while the Directorate-General of Personnel Administration announced that schools and government offices in most areas of southern and eastern Taiwan would be closed today. The affected regions are Tainan, Kaohsiung and Chiayi City, and Yunlin, Chiayi, Pingtung, Hualien and Taitung counties, as well as the outlying Penghu County. As of 10pm last night, the storm was about 370km east-southeast of Taitung County, moving west-northwest at 27kph, CWA data showed. With a radius of 120km, Podul is carrying maximum sustained
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