Source: reuters // Reuters
* Police recruits lining up for jobs
* Official blames al Qaeda for attack in Tikrit
* U.S. forces to withdraw this year
(Adds possible death tolls, survivor comment)
By Sabah al-Bazee
TIKRIT, Iraq, Jan 18 (Reuters) - A suicide bomber wearing a vest filled with explosives attacked Iraqi police recruits on Tuesday in former dictator Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, killing at least 42 and wounding over 100, officials said.
Ahmed Abdul-Jabbar, deputy governor of Salahuddin province, said the attack took place outside a police recruiting centre where Iraqi men were lining up hoping to get a job.
"Who else would it be but al Qaeda, who keep on slaughtering us," said Abdul-Jabbar. "They are the terrorists."
Abdul-Jabbar put the death toll at 42. Raed Ibrahim, head of the health department in the province, said 45 were killed and more than 150 wounded, while Interior Ministry sources in Baghdad said 50 people had died.
A police source in the city, 150 km (95 miles) north of Baghdad, said the main hospital was overwhelmed. Mosques broadcast appeals for residents to donate blood.
"The hospital theatre now is full of dead and wounded young people. Ambulances are still evacuating casualties," the police source said at the hospital, asking not to be identified.
A police spokesman said that, at the time of the attack, more than 300 people were standing in line with their documents, hoping to get a $500-a-month job as a police trainee.
"There were many killed and wounded. The place was full of dead and wounded guys," he said.
Overall violence in Iraq has fallen sharply since the peak in 2006/07 of the sectarian slaughter triggered after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion. But shootings and bombings remain a daily occurrence.
Salahuddin province, home to Saddam's family, continues to suffer frequent attacks by suspected Sunni Islamist insurgents opposed to the Shi'ite-led authorities in Baghdad. Tikrit is primarily Sunni.
DRIPPING BLOOD
Insurgents have stepped up their assaults on Iraqi police and troops since U.S. forces formally ended combat operations last August ahead of a full withdrawal this year.
The assault in Tikrit was the bloodiest since Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki secured backing to form his second government in December. It includes the Sunni-backed Iraqiya alliance, which won the most parliamentary seats in an election last March.
Excluding Iraqiya would have angered the Sunni voters and could have led to a surge in violence. A Salahuddin provincial council worker, Muhanad Abdulrahman, said he rushed out to a balcony when he heard there had been a bomb in the city centre.
"I saw a police pick-up truck rush by piled high with wounded people," he said. "Blood was dripping down the sides of the vehicle and the people in the back were covered in blood."
Police recruit Murtadha Ahmed said he was standing in line, hoping to get a job, when the attack took place.
"Suddenly I heard a severe explosion. I don't know what happened after that," he said. "When I opened my eyes I found myself in the hospital and (nurses) were dressing my wounds." (Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim and Ahmed Rasheed in Baghdad; Writing by Michael Christie; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
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Suicide bombing in Iraq kills 55 police recruits
Reuters – Bodies of bomb attack victims are seen outside a hospital in Tikrit, some 150 km (95 miles) north of …
By LARA JAKES and SAAD ABDUL-KADIR, Associated Press Lara Jakes And Saad Abdul-kadir, Associated Press – 46 mins ago
BAGHDAD – A suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowd of police recruits on Tuesday, killing at least 45 people and undercutting Iraqi security efforts as the nation struggles to show it can protect itself without foreign help.
The death toll was still rising more than three hours after police said the bomber joined a crowd of more than 100 recruits and detonated his explosives-packed vest outside the police station in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, some 80 miles (130 kilometers) north of Baghdad.
The attack starkly displayed the Iraqi forces' failure to plug even the most obvious holes in their security as the U.S. military prepares to withdraw from Iraq at the year's end. One recruit who survived the blast said the jobseekers were frisked before they entered the station's yard.
"We were waiting in the line to enter the police station yard after being searched when a powerful explosion threw me to the ground," said recruit Quteiba Muhsin, whose legs were fractured in the blast. "I saw the dead bodies of two friends who were in the line. I am still in shock because of the explosion and the scene of my two dead friends."
Loudspeakers from the city's mosques were calling on people to donate blood for the wounded. An Iraqi television station broadcast footage from the scene that showed pools of blood, bits of clothing and shoes of the victims scattered near a concrete blast wall.
Tikrit police put the death toll at 45, with 140 wounded. Dr. Anas Abdul-Khaliq of Tikrit hospital confirmed the casualty figures.
Tikrit is the capital of Sunni-dominated Salahuddin province, and the city sheltered some of al-Qaida's most fervent support after the 2003 U.S.-led invasion ousted Saddam.
Salahuddin provincial councilman Abdullah Jabara accused al-Qaida of being behind the attack.
"The aim of this terrorist attack carried out by al-Qaida operatives is to shake the security in the province and to bring back instability to Tikrit," Jabara said. "The security forces shoulder responsibility for this tragic incident."
Jabara said insurgents successfully exploited what he called "inefficiencies" and "breaches" in security measures, calling it "an indication that the terrorists are still on the job and all security forces should be on high alert all the time."
One Tikrit policeman said at least two of the dead were police officers. A second police official said a grenade that had not exploded was found near the scene.
The group of recruits was the first to vie for 2,000 new police jobs that Iraq's Interior Ministry recently approved for Salahuddin. They were waiting for interviews and medical checks as part of the application process, police said.
Both policemen spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release the information.
Insurgents have long found recruitment centers a favorite target, taking advantage of lax security measures just outside protective barriers at police stations and the confusion caused by desperate jobseekers scrambling for work in a country with an unemployment rate as high as 30 percent.
A similar strike on an Iraqi recruitment center and army headquarters in central Baghdad last August left 61 dead and 125 wounded in what was one of the deadliest attacks of the summer. Two weeks later, militants attacked the same building again, detonating a car bomb and trying to shoot their way in, killing eight and wounding 29.
Tuesday's attack was Iraq's deadliest since early November, when a series of bombings on mostly Shiite neighborhoods killed 76 across Baghdad, and followed a weekslong lull that saw mostly small-scale bombings and shootings instead of spectacular violence. It served as a reminder of how unpredictable Iraq's security remains, and that progress can be measured only in small steps.
Taxi driver Abdul-Hamid Mikhlaf described the scene in Tikrit as "horrific."
"I saw wounded people running in my direction calling for help and asking me to take them to the hospital immediately," he said. "I saw several bodies on the ground as the policemen started to shoot in the air."
Iraqi police targeted by suicide bomber, 12 killed
19 Jan 2011
Source: reuters // Reuters
BAQUBA, Iraq, Jan 19 (Reuters) - A suicide bomber driving an ambulance killed 12 people and wounded more than 50 in an attack on Wednesday on an Iraqi police training centre in volatile Diyala province, a spokeswoman for the provincial governor said.
"There are more bodies buried in the ruins," the governor's spokeswoman, Samira al-Shibli, told Reuters.
It was the second attack by a suicide bomber in two days on Iraqi security forces. At least 49 people were killed in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit on Tuesday when a suicide bomber attacked a line of police recruits. (Reporting by Baghdad Newsroom; Writing by Michael Christie; Editing by Maria Golovnina)
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Bomb attacks claim 17 lives in Iraq
Wed Jan 19, 2011 12:2PM
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At least 15 people have been killed and scores of others injured as two bomb explosions ripped through Iraq's northern province of Diyala.
Fifteen people were killed and are 64 others wounded when a bomber rammed an explosives-laden ambulance into a security headquarters in the middle of Baquba, located some 50 km (30 miles) to the northeast of the capital Baghdad, AFP reported on Wednesday.
The attack occurred at around 10:00 a.m. local time (0700 GMT). An unnamed security official said the attack targeted an office of the Force Protection Service. The agency is in charge of providing security for Iraqi government buildings.
Separately, two people were killed and a top provincial official was wounded when a bombing attack happened in a nearby town.
Baquba, the capital of Diyala province, has been the scene of frequent shootings and bombings. The city was as an urban bastion of al-Qaeda in Iraq as recently as 2008.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq is a shadowy group reportedly led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi. But some reports say Zarqawi was killed in June 2006.
According to US government and military officials, the group was then led by Ayyub al-Masri, who was killed along with Abu Omar al-Baghdadi -- another leader of the group -- in a joint Iraqi-US operation in Salahuddin province in April 2010.
Al-Qaeda in Iraq has been blamed for some of the deadliest terrorist attacks in the country since the US-led invasion of the country in 2003.
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