A pair of car bombs exploded near government offices in the Iraqi capital yesterday, killing 11 and wounding over 20 as insurgent attacks against the nation's nascent security forces left at least eight others dead countrywide.
The near-simultaneous explosions in a southeastern Baghdad neighborhood targeted one of the ministry's satellite offices, killing at least 11, an Interior Ministry official said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
At least 20 people injured in the blast were taken to Yarmouk Teaching Hospital, doctors and witnesses said. Hospital staff said four policemen were among the wounded in the bombings, which shook central Baghdad and sent two plumes of smoke boiling into the sky.
PHOTO: EPA
Insurgents kept up attacks yesterday against Iraq's security services, forces which the US military says must be able to impose a level of calm in the country before US troops can depart.
Gunmen hit police patroling near the central Iraq city of Baqubah, killing one officer and wounding three, Lieutenant Colonel Muthafar al-Jubori said.
In the capital, attackers shot 1st Lieutenant Firas Hussein in the head and torso as he made his way to work at Iraq's intelligence service, police Major Mousa Abdul Karim said.
In Kirkuk, seven gunmen riding in two vehicles fired on the police station just south of Kirkuk shortly after dawn yesterday, killing five police officers and one civilian, police Brigadier Sarhat Qadir said.
Militant group Ansar al-Sunnah claimed responsibility for the attack, saying in an Internet posting that its "knights of Islam" attacked "renegade policemen doing their morning training." The claim couldn't be independently verified.
Ansar al-Sunnah also said it had teamed up with Abu Musab al-Zarqawi's al-Qaeda in Iraq group for a day-earlier attack in Kirkuk -- an unusual mention of cooperation among Iraq's disparate and sometimes competing militant groups.
The Web posting, which couldn't be independently corroborated, said the Wednesday explosive device that killed 12 police was composed of three bombs buried under a decoy device -- a lure to draw policemen to the blast site.
In Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown 130km north of Baghdad, a car bomb exploded outside a US military installation, injuring nine civilians and setting nearby houses ablaze, police Lieutenant Colonel Amer Ahmed said.
The US military said one US soldier and two Iraqi troops suffered injuries in the bomb blast -- but maintained there were no civilian casualties.
On Wednesday, an American was shown at gunpoint on a videotape aired by al-Jazeera television, two days after he was kidnapped from a water treatment plant near Baghdad. The station said he pleaded for his life and urged US troops to withdraw from Iraq.
In LaPorte, Indiana, a yellow ribbon was tied Wednesday around a tree outside Jeffrey Ake's one-story brick house, and an American flag fluttered on a pole from the home. The US Embassy said the man on the video appeared to be Ake, a contract worker who was kidnapped around noon Monday.
Ake -- the 47-year-old president and CEO of Equipment Express, a company that manufacturers bottled water equipment -- is the latest of more than 200 foreigners seized in Iraq in the past year.
The al-Jazeera tape showed a man sitting behind a desk with at least three assailants -- two hooded and one off-camera -- pointing assault rifles at him. Ake, wearing an open-collar shirt with rolled-up shirt sleeves, was sitting or kneeling behind a wooden desk and holding what appeared to be a passport.
END OF AN ERA: The vote brings the curtain down on 20 years of socialist rule, which began in 2005 when Evo Morales, an indigenous coca farmer, was elected president A center-right senator and a right-wing former president are to advance to a run-off for Bolivia’s presidency after the first round of elections on Sunday, marking the end of two decades of leftist rule, preliminary official results showed. Bolivian Senator Rodrigo Paz was the surprise front-runner, with 32.15 percent of the vote cast in an election dominated by a deep economic crisis, results published by the electoral commission showed. He was followed by former Bolivian president Jorge “Tuto” Quiroga in second with 26.87 percent, according to results based on 92 percent of votes cast. Millionaire businessman Samuel Doria Medina, who had been tipped
ELECTION DISTRACTION? When attention shifted away from the fight against the militants to politics, losses and setbacks in the battlefield increased, an analyst said Recent clashes in Somalia’s semi-autonomous Jubaland region are alarming experts, exposing cracks in the country’s federal system and creating an opening for militant group al-Shabaab to gain ground. Following years of conflict, Somalia is a loose federation of five semi-autonomous member states — Puntland, Jubaland, Galmudug, Hirshabelle and South West — that maintain often fractious relations with the central government in the capital, Mogadishu. However, ahead of elections next year, Somalia has sought to assert control over its member states, which security analysts said has created gaps for al-Shabaab infiltration. Last week, two Somalian soldiers were killed in clashes between pro-government forces and
Ten cheetah cubs held in captivity since birth and destined for international wildlife trade markets have been rescued in Somaliland, a breakaway region of Somalia. They were all in stable condition despite all of them having been undernourished and limping due to being tied in captivity for months, said Laurie Marker, founder of the Cheetah Conservation Fund, which is caring for the cubs. One eight-month-old cub was unable to walk after been tied up for six months, while a five-month-old was “very malnourished [a bag of bones], with sores all over her body and full of botfly maggots which are under the
BRUSHED OFF: An ambassador to Australia previously said that Beijing does not see a reason to apologize for its naval exercises and military maneuvers in international areas China set off alarm bells in New Zealand when it dispatched powerful warships on unprecedented missions in the South Pacific without explanation, military documents showed. Beijing has spent years expanding its reach in the southern Pacific Ocean, courting island nations with new hospitals, freshly paved roads and generous offers of climate aid. However, these diplomatic efforts have increasingly been accompanied by more overt displays of military power. Three Chinese warships sailed the Tasman Sea between Australia and New Zealand in February, the first time such a task group had been sighted in those waters. “We have never seen vessels with this capability
RSS