IRAQ: Car bomb rips through a busy Shi'ite market in Baghdad, killing six people as Iraq faces a second day of attacks

Record ID: 357655

  • Title: IRAQ: Car bomb rips through a busy Shi'ite market in Baghdad, killing six people as Iraq faces a second day of attacks
  • Date: 16th May 2013
  • Summary: BAGHDAD, IRAQ (MAY 16, 2013) (REUTERS) PEOPLE GATHERING AT BLAST SCENE TRAFFIC POLICE MAN ATTACHING DAMAGED VEHICLE TO CRANE TRAFFIC POLICEMAN/ PAN TO WRECKED VEHICLES PEOPLE NEAR WRECKAGE OF CAR BOMB DAMAGED VEHICLES BEING TOWED AWAY PEOPLE INSIDE HOUSE DAMAGED BY BLAST INTERIOR OF DAMAGED HOUSE (SOUNDBITE) (ARABIC) ABU ALI, OWNER OF DAMAGED HOUSE, SAYING: "I was no
  • Embargoed: 31st May 2013 13:00
  • Keywords:
  • Location: Iraq
  • Country: Iraq
  • Topics: Crime,Conflict
  • Reuters ID: LVA3GNIE42GRQNSZ1OKI4RS0NQG4
  • Story Text: A car bomb exploded in a busy Shi'ite market in Sadr City, north-eastern Baghdad on Thursday (May 16) killing six people, police said.
    Nearby houses and shops were damaged in the blast and windows were shattered by the shockwave.
    "I was not here but I heard sound of explosion, then I came back home and I have been told that my kids are in the hospital. When I came here I saw the blast, you can see the destruction. Houses and belongings were damaged," said local man Abu Ali.
    The blast was one of three to hit markets in Shi'ite districts in the Iraqi capital on Thursday.
    A second bomb exploded in another market in Sadr City while a third targeted a small market in Kamaliya district.
    At least 14 people were killed in the there blasts, police and medical officials said.
    Bomb attacks in Shi'ite areas of Baghdad and in northern Iraq killed more than 35 people on Wednesday (May 15), following weeks of violence by Sunni Islamist insurgents determined to unleash sectarian confrontation.
    Tensions between minority Sunni Muslims and the Shi'ites who now lead Iraq are at their highest since U.S. troops pulled out in 2011, with relations coming under more pressure by the day from the largely sectarian conflict in neighbouring Syria.
    Relations between Iraq's Shi'ite, Sunni and ethnic Kurdish communities have come under growing strain since the last U.S. troops left in December 2011.
    The coalition government, split among Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish political blocs, is hobbled by disagreements about how to share power.
    But the conflict in neighbouring Syria, where mostly Sunni rebels are trying to oust President Bashar al-Assad, who follows the Alawite offshoot of Shi'ite Islam, has also put pressure on Iraq's delicate intercommunal balance.
    Although violence is well below the height of sectarian slaughter in 2006-7, when tens of thousands were killed, Sunni Islamist insurgents now carry out attacks almost daily to try to undermine the Shi'ite-led government.
  • Copyright Holder: REUTERS
  • Copyright Notice: (c) Copyright Thomson Reuters 2013. Open For Restrictions - http://about.reuters.com/fulllegal.asp
  • Usage Terms/Restrictions: None
Register