A car bomb exploded yesterday in a crowded cattle market south of Baghdad, killing at least 10 people and injuring 45 others, Iraqi police and medical officials said.
The parked car exploded at the height of the morning’s business at the market on the outskirts of Hillah, 95km south of Baghdad, Iraqi police Major Muthana Khalid said.
The blast scattered bodies and animal carcasses throughout the market, a witness said.
While violence has declined dramatically in Iraq during the past 18 months, there are growing concerns about a possible upward trend in bloodshed after a series of high-profile attacks on civilians and US and Iraqi security forces in recent weeks.
All the dead and injured in yesterday’s bombing were civilians, Khalid said. Hussam al-Janabi, a medical official in Hillah, confirmed the casualty figures.
Markets, mosques and religious shrines have been a favorite target of insurgents in Iraq because of the possibility of high casualty counts.
Dozens of cattle merchants, farmers, butchers and buyers were at the market in Hamza al-Gharbi, a mostly Shiite community a short distance from Hillah, when the bomb exploded.
The market operates daily but is at its busiest yesterday and today, cattle merchant Rajab Abdul-Hussein said.
Mohammed Abbas, a butcher, described a grisly scene of bodies and animal carcasses strewn throughout the market in the aftermath of the bombing.
“Blood and meat were everywhere,” Abbas said.
Witnesses told police the blast came from a car parked near the market’s main thoroughfare.
The Hillah area has been the site of many deadly bombings, including one of the worst attacks in Iraq since the 2003 US-led invasion.
In February 2005, a suicide car bomber killed 125 national guard and police recruits in Hillah.
‘IN A DIFFERENT PLACE’: The envoy first visited Shanghai, where he attended a Chinese basketball playoff match, and is to meet top officials in Beijing tomorrow US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday arrived in China on his second visit in a year as the US ramps up pressure on its rival over its support for Russia while also seeking to manage tensions with Beijing. The US diplomat tomorrow is to meet China’s top brass in Beijing, where he is also expected to plead for restraint as Taiwan inaugurates president-elect William Lai (賴清德), and to raise US concerns on Chinese trade practices. However, Blinken is also seeking to stabilize ties, with tensions between the world’s two largest economies easing since his previous visit in June last year. At the
UNSETTLING IMAGES: The scene took place in front of TV crews covering the Trump trial, with a CNN anchor calling it an ‘emotional and unbelievably disturbing moment’ A man who doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire outside the courthouse where former US president Donald Trump is on trial has died, police said yesterday. The New York City Police Department (NYPD) said the man was declared dead by staff at an area hospital. The man was in Collect Pond Park at about 1:30pm on Friday when he took out pamphlets espousing conspiracy theories, tossed them around, then doused himself in an accelerant and set himself on fire, officials and witnesses said. A large number of police officers were nearby when it happened. Some officers and bystanders rushed
Beijing is continuing to commit genocide and crimes against humanity against Uyghurs and other Muslim minorities in its western Xinjiang province, U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken said in a report published on Monday, ahead of his planned visit to China this week. The State Department’s annual human rights report, which documents abuses recorded all over the world during the previous calendar year, repeated language from previous years on the treatment of Muslims in Xinjiang, but the publication raises the issue ahead of delicate talks, including on the war in Ukraine and global trade, between the top U.S. diplomat and Chinese
RIVER TRAGEDY: Local fishers and residents helped rescue people after the vessel capsized, while motorbike taxis evacuated some of the injured At least 58 people going to a funeral died after their overloaded river boat capsized in the Central African Republic’s (CAR) capital, Bangui, the head of civil protection said on Saturday. “We were able to extract 58 lifeless bodies,” Thomas Djimasse told Radio Guira. “We don’t know the total number of people who are underwater. According to witnesses and videos on social media, the wooden boat was carrying more than 300 people — some standing and others perched on wooden structures — when it sank on the Mpoko River on Friday. The vessel was heading to the funeral of a village chief in