 Four car bombs shook Baghdad after dawn yesterday, killing at least 17 people and wounding dozens in the second wave of attacks within hours, police said. The previous evening car bombs in a mainly Shiite district of the city killed 18 people, after a day of talks in Brussels between the new Shiite-led government, its US backers and other nations. Guerrillas claimed responsibility. Police said a suicide car bomber killed three policemen and seven civilians when he drove at their patrol in the central commercial district of Karrada around 7 a.m. A second, similar attack killed seven civilians, they said. Two other cars exploded in the same area, several minutes apart, one near a Shiite mosque. Police and medical sources put the number of wounded at between 23 and 50. The Al-Qaeda organization in Iraq, led by Jordanian Abu Musab Al-Zarqawi, claimed responsibility for a "Sunni reprisal raid". Later, three further groups, notably Ansar Al-Sunna, laid claim collectively to the bombings. |