Suicide bombers slaughter Iraqis

Shocked ... residents pour through the rubble of a bombed market in Karbala. Picture: AFP

A CAR bomb slaughtered 47 people in Iraq's pilgrimage city of Karbala on Saturday, the latest brazen attack to undermine a security crackdown exactly two months after it began in Baghdad.
In the capital, 10 people died in a suicide attack while other attacks around the country killed another nine people, pushing the death toll to 66 before lunchtime.

The latest carnage comes two days after a suicide bombing in parliament's cafe stunned the world for its massive breach of security.

The Karbala bomb exploded in an area cluttered with popular market stalls around 200 metres from the Imam Hussein shrine, where hundreds of thousands of Shiite pilgrims flock every March during the Ashura commemorations.

At least 47 people were killed and another 62 wounded, said an Iraqi army source. Local security spokesman Rahman Mushawi earlier confirmed 40 people killed in the blast outside a bus station, car park and market stall complex.

Debris from smashed stalls was strewn on the ground as civilians helped ferry the wounded into ambulances. Shocked and dazed men wiped tears from their eyes, turning away from the bombing site engulfed in thick grey smoke.

Women and children were among the casualties, and four Iranians were counted among the wounded at hospital on the second day of the Iraqi weekend.

In Baghdad, a suicide bomber detonated his car next to a security checkpoint at the edge of the Jadiriyah bridge, killing 10 people and leaving another 15 wounded, most of them civilians, a security official said. >>>cont

LinkHere