Dozens of heavily armed attackers raided an open air market yesterday in a tense town south of Baghdad, killing at least 41 people and wounding 42, police and hospital officials said. Most of the victims were believed to be Shiites.
The attack in Mahmoudiya began with a brief mortar barrage, followed by an armed assault by dozens of gunmen. They killed three Iraqi soldiers at a checkpoint, then stormed the market firing automatic weapons and rocket propelled grenades, according to police Captain Rashid al-Samaraie.
Following the attack, police rushed to the market, arresting people at random in an attempt to find the assailants, witnesses said.
The attack sent shock waves through Mahmoudiya, an agricultural center with Shiites living in the town center and Sunnis in the outlying neighborhoods. Frantic relatives milled about the hospital, scuffling with guards and Iraqi soldiers who tried to keep order.
It appeared the raid was part of the escalating campaign of tit-for-tat sectarian killings which have overtaken the Sunni-led insurgency as the major security threat in Iraq.
Also on Monday, US Commerce Secretary Carlos Gutierrez arrived in Baghdad for meetings with Iraqi officials. Gutierrez signed an agreement with the Iraqis to encourage foreign investment, acknowledging that the country's deteriorating security made that goal a challenge.
US President George W. Bush promised to send more Cabinet officials to Baghdad to help the new government jump-start the economy, a key step toward restoring stability.
The Mahmoudiya raid occurred one day after a suicide bomber detonated explosives inside a cafe packed with Shiites in northern Iraq, killing 26 people and injuring 22, an Iraqi general said. And in Baghdad, gunmen seized a top Oil Ministry official on Sunday.
In the south, a British soldier was killed and another wounded during a raid on Sunday against a "terrorist suspect" in Basra, the British military said. British troops arrested a top Shiite militia leader in the city, Iraqi police said, but it was unclear if the two events were linked.
The US military said a US soldier was killed in a roadside bombing in south Baghdad.
The suicide attack occurred about 8.30pm on Sunday in the outdoor market in Tuz Khormato, a mostly Turkomen city 130 miles north of Baghdad, Major General Anwar Mohammed Amin said.
The powerful blast collapsed the ceiling of the one-story cafe, burying many of the victims, witnesses said. Hours afterward, rescuers were still sifting through the debris looking for the dead or injured.
One of Iraq's main ethnic groups, Turkomen follow both the Sunni and Shiite traditions of Islam. Amin said Shiites favored the cafe because it was near a Shiite mosque. But friction exists among Iraq's Turkomen and Kurdish populations, and the motive for the attack was unclear.
In Baghdad, gunmen seized Adel Kazzaz, director of the North Oil Co, shortly after he left the Oil Ministry in the east of the city, ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said.
The government-owned North Oil Co runs Iraq's oil fields around the northern city of Kirkuk, and Kazzaz was in the capital for a meeting with ministry officials.
A British military statement said the British soldier was mortally wounded during a raid to arrest terror suspects in northern Basra.
In Basra, police officials said British troops had arrested Sajid Badir, leader of the Shiite-based Mahdi Army in the city.
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