Monday, April 02, 2007
Truck bomb kills 13 in Kirkuk as 19 men kidnapped from Shia village
Security
(Reuters) - A suicide truck bomb killed 12 people and wounded 137 others in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Monday in the latest attack by insurgents using explosives-laden trucks. Many of the victims were women and children at a nearby school, police said. Insurgents have hit a string of northern Iraqi towns in the past 10 days in bombings that have killed hundreds of people. Officials have blamed the attacks on Sunni Islamist al Qaeda.
In other violence, the bodies of 19 men from a Shi'ite village kidnapped by gunmen at a fake checkpoint north of Baghdad were found on Monday, police said. All had been shot in the head in one of the biggest kidnappings in months. U.S. commanders say insurgents are shifting the focus of their attacks outside Baghdad because of a nearly seven-week-old crackdown in the capital. The U.S.-Iraqi offensive is seen as a final attempt to halt Iraq's plunge into sectarian civil war.
Police said the attacker in Kirkuk rammed his vehicle into the main gate of the police criminal investigation department and detonated the bomb, triggering a blast that echoed across the ethnically mixed city. The building was partially destroyed. In the mass kidnapping, gunmen seized the 19 men from a Shi'ite village near the city of Baquba after stopping cars at a fake checkpoint on Sunday. The bodies were found not far from Baquba, which lies 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad. A car bomb also killed two people and wounded nine others in the southern Bayaa district of Baghdad, police said.
In other violence, the bodies of 19 men from a Shi'ite village kidnapped by gunmen at a fake checkpoint north of Baghdad were found on Monday, police said. All had been shot in the head in one of the biggest kidnappings in months. U.S. commanders say insurgents are shifting the focus of their attacks outside Baghdad because of a nearly seven-week-old crackdown in the capital. The U.S.-Iraqi offensive is seen as a final attempt to halt Iraq's plunge into sectarian civil war.
Police said the attacker in Kirkuk rammed his vehicle into the main gate of the police criminal investigation department and detonated the bomb, triggering a blast that echoed across the ethnically mixed city. The building was partially destroyed. In the mass kidnapping, gunmen seized the 19 men from a Shi'ite village near the city of Baquba after stopping cars at a fake checkpoint on Sunday. The bodies were found not far from Baquba, which lies 65 km (40 miles) north of Baghdad. A car bomb also killed two people and wounded nine others in the southern Bayaa district of Baghdad, police said.
Labels: Baghdad, Baqouba, car bombs, kidnapping, Kirkuk, suicide truck bomber
