Iraq’s Bloody Day: US Role as Hundreds Killed, Wounded?!

Local Editor

Suicide attackers and car bombs hit cities across Iraq Monday, killing at least 70 people.

In the worst assault, a roadside bomb followed by a car bomb targeting police killed at least 37 people in Kut, a city 150 kilometers southeast of the capital Baghdad, police and health officials said.

The blasts shattered facades of shops and homes in Kut. Firefighters picked through wreckage and blood was spattered across the street near the crumpled remains of the car bomb.

Dhiyauddin Jalil, a director of the local provincial health department, said more than 68 people were wounded in the Kut blasts and doctors in the city's main hospital said they were struggling to treat casualties, many with severe burns.

"These attacks ... are trying to influence the security situation and undermine confidence in the security forces," said Maj. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, a spokesman for Baghdad security operations, blaming al-Qaeda-linked groups.

Dozens more were killed or wounded Monday in bombings and attacks in other cities north and south of the capital.

At least eight people were killed and 14 wounded when a suicide car bomber attacked a municipality building in Khan Bani Saad, about 30 kilometers northeast of Baghdad, in the province of Diyala, two police sources said Monday.

Two suicide bombers attacked an Iraqi counter-terrorism unit in Tikrit, 150 kilometers north of Baghdad, killing at least two policemen and wounding six in a failed attempt to free al-Qaeda prisoners, a police official said.

In the southern holy city of Najaf, at least six people were killed and up to 79 more wounded when two car bombs exploded, health authorities said. Police captain Hadi al-Najafi said the bombs targeted a police building.
 

"There was a roll call for the police in the early morning. The first killed and wounded policemen and as the ambulances came the second car exploded," said Mussab Mohammad, a local resident who witnessed the attacks.

At least four people were killed and 41 others wounded near Kerbala, 80 kilometers southwest of Baghdad, when a car bomb exploded near a police station, a local health department spokesman said.

One man was killed and 12 people were wounded in simultaneous car and motorbike bombings in the center of the northeastern city of Kirkuk, police sources said.

In Al-Wajehiya, another town in Diyala Province, a bomb in a parked car went off near a government building, killing one policeman and wounding 13, a police source said.

While the terrorist attacks punctured the calm of the Holy month of Ramadan, questions are raised on the US troop's role underscoring the fragility of Iraq's security as U.S. troops prepare to leave more than eight years after the invasion.
US soldiers are scheduled to leave by the end of the year.

Source: News Agencies