A bomb targeting a United States convoy killed at least four Iraqis and one US soldier in a crowded Baghdad street on Friday, just as a large pro-US demonstration in the capital condemned growing ”terrorism” against Iraqis and American troops.
Another 15 Iraqis, including two women and a child, were wounded in the blast about 200m from a mosque used by Sunni Muslims in the New Baghdad district, hospital and US military sources said.
Witnesses said a minibus with about 20 people aboard was setting down passengers when the bomb detonated as the three-vehicle US convoy passed, sending flying glass and metal ripping through the occupants.
”A 22nd Signal Brigade soldier was killed today in eastern Baghdad at approximately 9.20am [6.20am GMT],” the US-led coalition said.
”The soldier was travelling in a three-vehicle convoy when an improvised explosive device detonated between the first and second vehicles.”
The statement did not mention US wounded.
Witnesses had reported seeing at least one US soldier covered in blood and as many as three hurt before the convoy drove away from the devastation.
Blood, pieces of flesh, discarded clothing and shoes littered the street, an AFP reporter saw.
Ahmed Ali, a sweet seller, said: ”It’s a cowardly act. They hurt one American but they killed and wounded far more Iraqis. I saw one American soldier badly wounded and covered in blood.
”When it exploded the street was blocked with traffic. People in a small truck were killed or wounded as well as some passers-by.”
The nearby Al-Kindi hospital took in the first casualties.
”About 10 this morning we received three dead … and 13 wounded,” said Karim Abdullah Muslim, head of the emergency room.
”Two or three of them are seriously wounded. The rest are slight injuries. A woman was among the dead and three women were also wounded. Two children were lightly injured,” he said.
Eleven-year-old Haidar Aziz Qassem, who was in the minibus, said at the hospital that he had been going shopping with his mother and aunt.
”Suddenly we heard a big bang and I was hit in my leg. My mum and aunt were so badly hurt they’ve been moved to another hospital.”
At almost the same time, about 1 000 Iraqis, mostly Shiite Muslims, rallied in central Baghdad to protest against the daily attacks by anti-US insurgents.
Dozens of children aged between five and 10 marched at the front of the protest, with flowers in their hands, under white banners proclaiming in red letters: ”Children — innocent victims of terrorism” and ”Terrorism blocks any future for children”.
Organiser Sabih Hassan, head of a child protection association set up since the US-led invasion, said they had all ”become orphans because of terrorism”.
Hassan said the march, the second here in a week, was against ”all operations, including those targeting Americans”.
”Our children have a vital need for peace and security.”
The ”Iraqi democratic trend”, set up after the war by tribes in the Shiite areas of Karbala and Babel in central Iraq, organised the demonstration, said general secretary Aziz al-Yassiri.
Sheikh Abdul Jalil Cherhani (55), a leading member of the group, said: ”We are against those who kill Iraqis, those who fight the Americans who liberated the country.”
Iraq’s majority Shiite community suffered some of the worst repression from the ousted regime of Saddam Hussein, which put down a Shiite rebellion at the loss of thousands of lives in the aftermath of the 1991 Gulf War.
But another demonstration organiser, Hathem al-Awadi, criticised the coalition’s plan to help stem the violence by deploying former Saddam opponents.
”Formation of this militia, if indeed it goes ahead, will lead to a bloodbath,” said Awadi.
”The only solution is to reconstitute the Iraqi army — its members are ordinary people who suffered under Saddam like everyone else.”
But interim Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, himself a member of an armed opposition group — the Kurdistan Democratic Party — late on Thursday welcomed the plan to set up the new unit to work with US Special Forces, saying it had not come soon enough.
Meanwhile, radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr threatened on Friday to call a general strike next month if US forces failed to release detained members of his movement.
He gave no details about who exactly was being held by US forces. — Sapa-AFP