Skip to main content
BBC NEWS / MIDDLE EAST
Graphics VersionBBC Sport Home
News Front Page | Africa | Americas | Asia-Pacific | Europe | Middle East | South Asia | UK | Business | Health | Science & Environment | Technology | Entertainment | Also in the news | Have Your Say |
Tuesday, 23 May 2006, 18:41 GMT 19:41 UK

Mosque bomb kills 11 in Baghdad

Aftermath of Baghdad car bombing A bomb attack outside a Shia mosque in Baghdad has killed at least 11 people and wounded at least nine, hours after 10 died in two separate car bombs.

Officials said the bomb may have been planted in a motorbike near the mosque, in Baghdad's Tunis district.

Earlier an attack on police commandos killed five people in eastern Baghdad.

A second blast killed another five in one of the largest markets in the Sadr City area, home to about two million Shia Muslims in north-east Baghdad.

Elsewhere, three men were killed when gunmen shot at their vehicle as they looked for work near Baquba.

The police said the men were visiting the mixed Shia-Sunni area from a neighbouring Shia-dominated town.

The latest violence came a day after UK Prime Minister Tony Blair flew to Baghdad for talks with his new Iraqi counterpart Nouri Maliki.

He said they had agreed Iraqi forces should start taking over responsibility for security from US-led coalition troops in the coming months.

"There is now no excuse for people to carry on with terrorism and bloodshed," Mr Blair said.

Sectarian murders

An Iraqi military commander said there had been an increase in insurgency attacks since the formation of the new government on Saturday.

Gen Abdul Aziz Muhammad said 98 civilians had been killed and 208 wounded in attacks in the seven days to Monday.

Relatives look at a victim of violence at a Baghdad hospital About 85 suspected insurgents were killed by international and Iraqi forces in the same period, he added.

In other attacks reported on Tuesday, four members of a family of blacksmiths died when gunmen drove up next to their car and opened fire in the northern city of Mosul.

In another incident, the corpse was found of a 10-year-old boy who had been kidnapped from his home the day before.

Police said Hani Sadoun had bullet wounds to the head and chest and bore the marks of having been tortured with rubber cables and electric drills, as well as being dragged behind a car.

Correspondents said the killing was likely to have been an extreme example of the tit-for-tat sectarian murders that have convulsed Iraq since the bombing of a Shia shrine in February.

The UN Assistance Mission in Iraq said in its March-April human rights report nearly 2,500 people had died in acts of violence in those two months, while more than 85,000 had fled their homes.

The death toll was gleaned from death certificates issued by the Baghdad mortuary - 1,294 in March and 1,155 in April - and most had died from bullet wounds, the UN report said.

More than 14,000 families had been displaced, according to the International Organisation of Migration - almost all of them Shia and Sunni Muslims leaving areas dominated by the other sect.



E-mail this to a friend

RELATED INTERNET LINKS:
US Department of Defense
Iraqi Government
The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites



SEARCH BBC NEWS: 

News Front Page | Africa | Americas | Asia-Pacific | Europe | Middle East | South Asia | UK | Business | Health | Science & Environment | Technology | Entertainment | Also in the news | Have Your Say |

NewsWatch | Notes | Contact us | About BBC News | Profiles | History

^ Back to top | BBC Sport Home | BBC Homepage | Contact us | Help | ©