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Suicide bomber kills 36 at Shi'ite funeral in Karbala
A suicide bomber killed 36 people and wounded 40 at a Shia funeral yesterday and a car bomb exploded in the lately peaceful city of Karbala, ratcheting up tension between Iraqâs sects.A car bomb also went off in a district of Baghdad, killing three. The bombers defied a major security operation, launched to find the kidnapped sister of a government minister, to detonate the vehicle in the north of the city. The violence was the worst since the largely peaceful on December 15 election and came as Shia, Sunni and Kurdish politicians pledged to plough on with efforts to form a national unity government capable of stemming the bloodshed. The funeral attack took place in Miqdadiya, 100km northeast of the capital, where people were mourning a bodyguard to a local leader of the Dawa party, headed nationally by Prime Minister Ibrahim Al Jaafari. In Iraqâs bloodiest single attack since earlier December, assailants fired mortars on the mourners, forcing them to take cover in the cemetery. A bomber wearing an explosive vest then blew up among them, security officials said. The area around Miqdadiya, in Diyala province, has seen mounting violence in recent weeks and security officials have said hardline groups such as Al Qaeda have been increasingly active in the area. The massacre came just hours after Baghdadâs first fatal car bomb attack of 2006. The bombers appeared to have targeted two passing police cars but the three dead and 13 wounded were all civilians, hit by shrapnel from a blast which damaged at least 10 cars. While Baghdadâs beleaguered inhabitants have grown used to such attacks, the blast in Karbala was a rarity of late â the first of its kind in the Shiâite holy city since December 2004 when a car bomb killed 12 and wounded 30. Police said three civilians were injured. In March 2004, coordinated suicide bombings during the annual religious festival of Ashura killed more than 90 people in Kerbala, an act blamed on militant Abu Musab Al Zarqawi, head of Al Qaeda in Iraq. But since then, the city has been relatively quiet. Any attack there is likely to have had some sectarian motive. Posted by: Dan Darling 2006-01-05 |
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