Up to 47 die as car bomb strikes Iraq army centre

[Pink Spider]

http://news.scotsman.com/index.cfm?id=168202004

UP to 47 people died today when a suicide attacker blew up a car packed with explosives in a crowd of hundreds of Iraqis waiting outside an army recruiting centre in Baghdad.

It is the second bombing in 24 hours after more than 50 died when a bomber struck at a police station in the Iraqi capital yesterday.

The attack fuelled warnings insurgents are stepping up violence against those co-operating with United States forces to disrupt the planned June 30 handover of power to the Iraqis.

Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt, the military’s deputy operations chief in Baghdad, said: "This could be part of the ongoing pattern of intimidation we’ve seen of late. We have stated numerous times that in the lead-up to governance, there could be an uptick in the violence."

Colonel Ralph Baker, of the 1st Armored Division, said there was no immediate indication who was behind today’s attack, but he said it resembled "the operating technique" of al-Qaida or Ansar al-Islam, a radical Muslim group linked to Osama bin Laden’s terror network. The 7.25 am blast tore into would-be army volunteers waiting outside the recruitment centre less than a mile from the heavily fortified green zone, where the US administration has its headquarters.

Col Baker said a man driving a white 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Sierra detonated about 300 to 500 lb (135 to 225 kg) of explosives.

Casualty reports varied. Major John Frisbie, spokesman of the 2nd Brigade 1st Armored Division, put the death toll at 36. Iraq’s deputy interior minister, Ahmed Ibrahim, said 47 people were killed and 50 injured. He told reporters "this crime" will "not deter the people’s march toward freedom". One hospital counted at least 37 bodies, while another reported one more.

Charred debris from the vehicle was scattered across the road in front of the centre as a heavy rain soaked troops and FBI agents looking for evidence at the blast scene.

The recruitment centre was surrounded by barbed wire and had sandbagged posts in front of it. But around 300 Iraqis were gathered outside the centre’s locked gates, waiting for it to open, and were completely exposed. Some of them were lined up to join the military and others waiting to depart for a training camp.

Ghasan Sameer, 32, an officer in the new Iraqi army who was among the wounded, said the car drove into the crowd and ran people over before exploding.

It was at least the ninth vehicle bombing in Iraq this year. US forces have been preparing the Iraqi police and military to take a larger role in battling the anti-US insurgency.

[BigBadBrian]

Thanks for the news update. Got any sports info?

[Cathedral]

I do, America: 100, Insurgents: 0

They are geting desperate and everyone should be condemning these attacks instead of throwing it around as if it were their golden pig...

[Pink Spider]

http://www.baltimoresun.com/news/nat...orld-headlines

Shiites turn against U.S. amid growing despair
By Matthew McAllester
Newsday
Originally published February 12, 2004
BAGHDAD - The day before, the bombers had struck applicants to the Iraqi police. Yesterday, it was the turn of men lining up to join the new Iraqi army.

The effect of the suicide bombings was almost identical: Scores killed, fury directed at the occupying forces and a despair expressed among many that Iraq's security is only worsening as the proposed handover to a new Iraqi government inches closer.

"The Americans did it," said one wounded applicant, Hussein Raed, 20, as he lay in a bed at Yarmuk Hospital in Baghdad. "Can you imagine the Iraqis would do this to Iraqis? This is political. They want to control the country. They suspect that the new army would be against them."

While not, perhaps, a very credible theory, it was a common theme among survivors of the attack yesterday that killed at least 46 and the one Tuesday in Iskandariyah, south of Baghdad, where a huge bomb killed more than 50 people, most of them applicants for police jobs.

[Early today, a roadside bomb killed two American soldiers in Baghdad, the Associated Press reported. The blast went off last evening in a western neighborhood of the capital, killing the soldiers from the Army's 1st Armored Division, a spokesman for the U.S. command said.

[The deaths bring to 374 the number of Americans who have been killed in hostile action since the beginning of military operations in Iraq. A total of at least 534 Americans have died, including non-combat deaths.]

What made Raed's comments bode especially ill for the immediate future of his country is that he, like most people in Iskandariyah, is a Shiite Muslim.

Interviews with scores of Iraqi Shiites in the past week - in the aftermath of the two bombings and also in calmer settings - suggest a growing cynicism within their community about the U.S. effort in Iraq.

It is Iraq's Sunnis who have so far been most hostile to the American forces. Iraq's top Shiite spiritual leader, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has insisted on direct elections in June to choose the new government. The United States wants regional caucuses, saying Iraq is not yet sufficiently peaceful to prevent widespread violence during an election.

With a team of experts from the United Nations assessing the situation in Iraq now, the bombings of the past two days appear to damage greatly the chances that the U.N. group will agree with Sistani and support elections.

Neither Iraqi officials nor the U.S. military provides comprehensive figures on Iraqi casualties nationwide.

Iraq's Interior Ministry said in a statement that 46 people died and 54 were wounded in yesterday's explosion, while the U.S.-led coalition said 47 were killed and 55 wounded.

U.S. military officials said the attack was the work of a suicide bomber in a white 1991 Oldsmobile Cutlass Sierra carrying 300 to 500 pounds of explosives.

"I was standing in line to get the application form," said Raed, whose black hair and mustache were singed orange by the blast. "When I got the form, they told me to go in the other line next to the street. It was a white car, and it stopped at the end of the line and then reversed toward us."

The center was surrounded by barbed wire and sandbags, but the men lining up outside were vulnerable to attack. Survivors complained that U.S. forces had left them exposed only a day after the Iskandariyah bombing had shown how easy it can be for suicide attackers to target recruitment centers for the new Iraqi security forces.

At Yarmuk Hospital, Saad Shilaga al-Haideri, 27, blamed "terrorists" who "have a conflict with the Americans. They don't want stability in Iraq."

Normally a laborer, al-Haideri was in the line when the bomber struck. Like other would-be recruits, he had lost all enthusiasm for joining one of the new Iraqi institutions that have become targets for insurgents.

"No, I won't try to join the army again," he said, his head in a bandage. "There is no benefit in joining. I survived this today. But tomorrow, who knows what would happen to me?"

[Dave's PA Rental]

so thats a "no" on the sports info?