IRAQ: Twenty people killed in suicide bomb attack in Sadr city

Record ID: 356157

  • Title: IRAQ: Twenty people killed in suicide bomb attack in Sadr city
  • Date: 18th April 2007
  • Summary: (W3) SADR CITY, BAGHDAD, IRAQ (APRIL 18, 2007) (REUTERS) DAMAGED CARS AT SITE OF ATTACK VARIOUS OF CROWD AT SCENE OF BLAST DAMAGED CARS/ ONLOOKERS CROWD NEAR BURNT-OUT CAR SMOULDERING WRECKAGE OF CAR CROWD REMOVING CHARRED BODY FROM BURNT-OUT CAR BURNT-OUT CARS FIREFIGHTERS HOSING CAR WITH WATER CROWD AT SITE OF ATTACK WRECKAGE OF MINIBUS FIRE ENGINE AT SCENE PEOPLE WALKIN
  • Embargoed: 3rd May 2007 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Iraq
  • Country: Iraq
  • Topics: Crime / Law Enforcement
  • Reuters ID: LVA2290GK05WBRGWSH8SAJ5QMPBU
  • Story Text: A string of bombings killed scores of people in Baghdad on Wednesday, hours after Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki said Iraq would take security control of the whole country from foreign forces by the end of the year. Twenty people were killed and 31 wounded in a suicide car bomb attack on Wednesday (April 18) at a checkpoint in the Shi'ite stronghold of Sadr City in Baghdad, Iraqi police said.
    The attack occurred on the day that Iraq suffered its deadliest attacks in the city since U.S. and Iraqi forces launched a security crackdown in February aimed at halting the country's slide into civil war. Nearly 170 people were killed in the wave of apparently coordinated attacks.
    Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki is under growing pressure to say when U.S. troops will leave, but the series of at least five bomb attacks in mainly Shi'ite areas illustrated the huge security challenges.
    The attacks could inflame sectarian passions in Baghdad, especially among the Mehdi Army militia militia of anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, which has been keeping a low profile since the new security crackdown began.
    Sadr withdrew his six ministers from Maliki's cabinet on Monday to press for a pull-out timetable for the 146,000 U.S. troops in Iraq.
    Baghdad has been the epicentre of violence in Iraq since suspected al Qaeda militants blew up a holy Shi'ite shrine in the city of Samarra in February 2006.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
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