Car Bomb in Kirkuk Leaves 4 Dead

07/29/2006

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) - A car packed with explosives blew up in a residential district of Kirkuk on Saturday, killing four people and injuring 13, police said. The U.S. command said three U.S. Marines died in action in western Iraq.

The bombing occurred around 2 p.m. in the al-Wasiti district of Kirkuk, about 180 miles north of Baghdad. It was the sixth car bombing this month in Kirkuk, where tensions are rising among Arabs, Kurds and Turkomen for control of the area’s vast oil wealth.

The western regional commander of the Iraqi Border Protection Force, Brig. Gen. Jawad Hadi al-Selawi, was killed in Karbala, 50 miles south of Baghdad, police said.

Sectarian violence has escalated in Iraq in recent months, with Sunni radicals - including members of al-Qaida - and Shiite militias staging reprisal killings. Thousands from both sects have fled the country, according to Iraqi officials.


Gunmen in two cars sprayed gunfire at the Muhammad Rassulluallah mosque in western Baghdad shortly after midnight, shattering its windows and damaging walls, police said. One guard was injured.

The Marines died Thursday in Anbar, the western province that is a focal point of the Sunni-dominated insurgency. A U.S. statement said they were attached to the Army’s 1st Armored Division, which operates in Ramadi, but gave no further details.

Their deaths brought the number of U.S. service members who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003 to at least 2,573, according to an Associated Press count. The figure includes seven military civilians.

In Baghdad, six day laborers were wounded when a bomb exploded downtown in Tayaran Square, where the workers had gathered to wait for jobs. Three policemen were also wounded when a roadside bomb struck their patrol on the northern side of the capital, police said.

A Sunni cleric from a tribe opposed to al-Qaida in Iraq was killed while driving in Samarra, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, police said.


Iraq’s national soccer coach resigned after receiving a death threat, sports officials said. The country’s wresting coach was killed July 13. Two days later, more than 30 sports officials, including the chairman of Iraq’s Olympic Committee, were seized during a meeting in Baghdad.

At least 10 have been freed, but dozens are still missing, including National Olympic Committee chairman Ahmed al-Hijiya.

The head of Iraq’s biggest Shiite party called Friday for a greater security role for Iraqis in place of Americans.

The U.S. plans to put more American soldiers on the streets of Baghdad to try to curb sectarian violence.

The American plan calls for moving up to 5,000 additional U.S. troops with armored vehicles and tanks into the capital. Some critics believe the move will undermine confidence among Iraqi forces and expose more U.S. soldiers to attacks by Sunni insurgents and Shiite militias.


Al-Hakim, the former commander of the feared Badr Brigade militia, has long complained the Americans have interfered with Iraqi forces’ efforts to crack down on Sunni insurgents and al-Qaida in Iraq terrorists. He said the surging violence was due to “being lax in hunting down terrorists and upholding the wrong policies in dealing with them.”

Al-Hakim said Sunni extremists and Saddam Hussein loyalists were to blame for the violence.

Al-Hakim’s speech marked the third anniversary of the death of his elder brother, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqr al-Hakim, who was killed by an al-Qaida-linked car bomb attack in Najaf.

In other violence Saturday:

- Four unidentified bodies riddled with bullets were found, two behind a school in western Baghdad and two by the Tigris river.

- A mortar and rocket-propelled grenade attack on police in Fallujah left four injured.

- Gunmen fired on a taxi in Baghdad carrying a father and son, killing the boy.