Violent Weekend in Iraq Kills Over 220http://www.chron.com/disp/story.mpl/ap/world/4951610.htmlBy ROBERT H. REID (Associated Press Writer)
From Associated Press
July 08, 2007 4:12 PM EDT
BAGHDAD -
Prominent Shiite and Sunni politicians called on Iraqi civilians to take up arms
to defend themselves after a weekend of violence that claimed more than 220 lives,
including 60 who died Sunday in a surge of bombings and shootings around Baghdad.
The calls reflect growing frustration with the inability of Iraqi security forces
to prevent extremist attacks.
The weekend deaths included two American soldiers — one killed Sunday in a bombing
on the western outskirts and Baghdad and another who died in combat Saturday in
Salahuddin province north of the capital, the U.S. command said.
Three soldiers were wounded in the Sunday blast.
Sunday's deadliest attack occurred when a bomb struck a truckload of newly recruited
Iraqi soldiers on the outskirts of Baghdad, killing 15 soldiers and wounding 20, a police
official at the nearest police station said on condition of anonymity because he was not
authorized to release the information.
Also Sunday, two car bombs exploded near simultaneously in Baghdad's mostly Shiite Karradah
district, killing eight people. The first detonated at 10:30 a.m., near a closed restaurant,
destroying stalls and soft drink stands. Two passers-by were killed and eight wounded,
a police official said.
About five minutes later, the second car exploded about a mile away near shops selling leather
jackets and shoes. Six people were killed and seven wounded, said the official, who also spoke
on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.
The Karradah area includes the offices of the Supreme Islamic Council in Iraq, the biggest
Shiite party in parliament, and is considered among the safest parts of the capital.
Elsewhere, a bomb hidden under a car detonated Sunday at the entrance of Shorja market
— amostly Shiite area of central Baghdad that has been hit repeatedly by insurgents
— killing three civilians and wounding five, police said.
Police also reported they found the bodies of 29 men Sunday scattered across Baghdad
— presumed victims of sectarian death squads. Four other people were killed Sunday in
separate shootings in Baghdad, police said on condition of anonymity because they were
not supposed to release the information.
The string of attacks in the Iraqi capital showed that extremists can still unleash strikes
in the city despite a relative lull in violence here in recent weeks amid the U.S. offensives
in and around Baghdad.
But the bloodshed in the Baghdad area paled in comparison to the carnage Saturday, when a
truck bomb devastated the public market in Armili, a town north of the capital whose
inhabitants are mostly Shiites from the Turkoman ethnic minority.
There was still confusion over the death toll.
Two police officers — Col. Sherzad Abdullah and Col. Abbas Mohammed Amin — said 150 people
were killed. Other officials out the death toll at 115. Abbas al-Bayati, a Shiite Turkoman
lawmaker, told reporters in Baghdad that 130 had died.
Regardless of the precise figure, the attack was clearly among the deadliest in Iraq in months.
It reinforced suspicions that al-Qaida extremists were moving north to less protected regions
beyond the U.S. security crackdown in Baghdad and on the capital's northern doorstep.
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