IRAQ: SUICIDE BOMBERS KILL AT LEAST SIXTY EIGHT PEOPLE IN ATTACKS ON FOUR POLICE STATIONS IN BASRA. / PAUL BREMER PRESS CONFERENCE IN BAGHDAD.

Record ID: 355666

  • Title: IRAQ: SUICIDE BOMBERS KILL AT LEAST SIXTY EIGHT PEOPLE IN ATTACKS ON FOUR POLICE STATIONS IN BASRA. / PAUL BREMER PRESS CONFERENCE IN BAGHDAD.
  • Date: 21st April 2004
  • Summary: (U2) BASRA, IRAQ (APRIL 21, 2004) (REUTERS - ACCESS ALL) 1. WS: SITE OF EXPLOSION WITH POLICE CAR AND FIRE ENGINE. 0.04 2. CU: REMAINS OF BURNING DEBRIS. (2 SHOTS) 0.14 3. MV: CHARRED POLICE CAR. 0.19 4. CU: BLOOD ON GROUND. 0.25 5. CU: MORE OF POLICE CAR WITH WINDOW SHATTERED. 0.29 6. WS: OF SCENE WITH CROWD GATHERI
  • Embargoed: 6th May 2004 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: BASRA AND BAGHDAD, IRAQ
  • Country: Iraq
  • Reuters ID: LVACNAI2SZF56J3TUL7HAKFAU35B
  • Story Text: Suicide bombers killed at least 68 people, many of
    them children, in co-ordinated strikes on four police
    stations in Basra.



    Suicide bombers killed at least 68 people, many of
    them children, in co-ordinated strikes on four police
    stations that inflicted bloody chaos on Iraq's southern
    city of Basra on Wednesday (April 21), officials said.

    Near-simulta
    neous explosions hit three police stations
    in Basra and one in the town of Zubair, 25 km (16 miles)
    south of the mainly Shi'ite city, the British military said.

    The explosions sowed panic across Basra, which had been
    relatively peaceful during this month's surge of violence
    in other parts of central and southern Iraq.

    Several charred vehicles, including a minibus, lay in
    the street at the scene of one blast.

    "We were in the house. We heard a really loud explosion
    throughout the whole city. We ran out to try and help
    people and help the injured and, when we arrived here, we
    found bodies everywhere," a man at the scene said.

    Iraq's Coalition Provisional Authority, which in Basra
    is British-led, vowed to pursue those behind "these
    despicable attacks".

    Speaking in Baghdad, Iraq's Interior Minister Samir
    al-Sumaidai said the Iraqi government was determined to
    find those responsible for the Basra bombings and bring
    them to justice.

    "The terrorists want to lead Iraq down the path of
    darkness and chaos. The Iraqi government condemns this and
    is determined to find these people and bring them to
    justice and bring an end to this cancer that's invading the
    body of Iraq. Every life that has been lost, every child
    who has been lost has been lost by the whole of Iraq,"
    Sumaidai said.

    The head of the coalition provisional authority in
    Iraq, Paul Bremer, stressed that forces of the U.S.-led
    coalition and Iraqis had to work together to defeat those
    carrying out attacks in the country.

    "We don't have any information yet on who conducted
    these attacks this morning, but they showed once again that
    the terrorists are willing to kill as many people as they
    can, indiscriminately, and they seem to have killed quite a
    number of school children today, in addition to policemen.

    They have a very warped view of the future of Iraq, but
    it certainly is not the kind of Iraq that we all hope for.

    It's not a democratic Iraq, it's an Iraq where power comes
    from the use of violence against innocents, innocent
    schoolchildren or policemen.

    We have to do everything we can to defeat - and when I
    say "we", I mean not just the coalition, I mean the Iraqis
    and the coalition. We have to work together to defeat these
    security threats," Bremer told a group of Iraqi academics
    in Baghdad.





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