A suicide car bomber blew himself up in a crowded market in oil-rich southern Basra on Saturday, killing 28 people and wounding 62. In Baghdad, a Russian diplomat was killed and four diplomatic employees were kidnapped.
Meanwhile, Iraq’s prime minister is poised to appoint ministers to run the army and police, despite lingering disagreement among Iraq’s ethnic and sectarian parties. Filling the posts is seen as a key step toward Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki’s plan for Iraqi forces to take control of security from United States-led troops in 18 months’ time.
Around Iraq, at least 42 people were killed on Saturday and dozens were wounded, and police discovered the remains of 12 people, including eight severed heads.
On Sunday, gunmen in a car opened the fire on a minibus carrying telecommunications employees to work in an area near the Shi’ite slum of Sadr City, killing four and wounding two, Colonel Hassan Challoub said.
In Basra, the country’s second-biggest city, the suicide car bomb exploded in the late afternoon on Saturday when many people were shopping, police Captain Mushtaq Kadhim said. The blast left pools of blood around the market square and set several vehicles on fire.
It wasn’t known who staged the attack, but Basra has seen growing violence and unrest, leading al-Maliki last week to declare a month-long state of emergency in the mainly Shi’ite city.
The attack came one day after Jordanian-born terrorist mastermind Abu Musab al-Zarqawi called on Iraq’s Sunni Arabs to kill Shi’ites. His al-Qaeda in Iraq has claimed responsibility for some of the most horrific attacks in Iraq, including bombings that have killed more than 100 people.
In Baghdad, gunmen attacked a Russian diplomatic car just after noon, killing one Russian foreign-service employee and kidnapping four, Russia’s foreign ministry said in a statement. The ministry identified the slain Russian as Vitaly Vitalyevich Titov, according to the Itar-Tass news agency.
The Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party condemned the attack and called on the kidnappers to release the Russians immediately. It also urged the Iraqi government to take action to secure Baghdad and other Iraqi cities and ”put an end to these crimes”.
At least 439 foreigners, including diplomats, have been kidnapped in Iraq since the US-led invasion three years ago, according to figures provided earlier this month by a US anti-kidnapping task force. Russia opposed the US-led invasion of Iraq and has no troops here but maintains a diplomatic presence.
Associated Press Television News footage showed a white SUV with tinted windows and diplomatic license plates, a type of car favoured by US officials and security contractors and often targeted by insurgents. A small paper tag in the car window reading ”Russian embassy” in English and Arabic was punctured by a bullet hole.
Amid the violence, al-Maliki held last-minute negotiations with Sunni and Shi’ite leaders. Al-Maliki planned on Sunday to announce his choices for interior and defence ministers, two weeks after his government of national unity took office.
Sunni Arabs complained that negotiators for al-Maliki’s Shi’ite faction again rejected their candidates for defence minister. They said they would hold further talks early on Sunday before Parliament convened. The interior-ministry post will go to a Shi’ite, the defence ministry to a Sunni Arab.
”We want to solve the problem and rebuild our country and that we present what we see competent enough to achieve this goal,” Sunni Arab deputy Sheik Khalaf al-Elyan said.
Fellow Sunni Arab legislator Hashim al-Taie said the issue had to settled on Sunday ”because it’s taking so long and the Iraqi people are expecting us to solve their problems”.
Iraqi police found eight severed heads north of Baghdad with a note indicating they were killed in retaliation for the slaying of four Shi’ite doctors. Five of the slain men were security guards at a Baghdad hospital complex who had been arrested on Thursday by Iraqi police, police Lieutenant Colonel Adil al-Zihari said. At least four other bodies were found across Baghdad.
In other violence Saturday, according to police:
Gunmen ambushed a police checkpoint in the capital, killing seven police and wounding five pedestrians.
Six mortar rounds hit a central Baghdad square, killing a child.
Drive-by attackers shot and killed two car-parts salesmen and a mechanic as they worked at their shop in Baqouba.
Gunmen in a car opened fire on two people in another vehicle, killing one and wounding the other, in the predominantly Sunni Dora neighbourhood in southern Baghdad.
Gunmen stopped an ambulance and opened fire in Dora, killing the driver and wounding a passenger.
— Sapa-AP
Associated Press writers Sinan Salaheddin and Kim Gamel contributed to this report