Bombs detonated across central Iraq on Monday, adding 40 more bloodied corpses to the grim toll of Iraqi dead as rebel groups mount a savage challenge to the latest United States and Iraqi security plan.
The attacks will in the main be blamed on Sunni insurgents and appear to have been timed to embarrass US and Iraqi commanders as they deploy tens of thousands of troops to try to quell Baghdad’s vicious sectarian war.
Two American soldiers were also killed and 17 wounded in what the US military dubbed a ”coordinated attack on a coalition-force combat outpost” in Tarmiyah, about 30km north of the capital.
”Insurgents initiated the attack on the outpost with a suicide vehicle-borne improvised explosive device detonation,” a US statement said. ”The attack site has been secured and wounded soldiers have been evacuated.”
The deaths brought to 3 133 the number of US service officers who have died in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion, according to Pentagon figures.
Five Iraqi commuters were killed by a bomb that gutted a bus in the mixed but largely Shi’ite district of Karrada, one day after a double car bombing ripped through a crowd in a city market and killed more than 60 people.
In a second attack, a roadside bomb exploded in the path of a police patrol in nearby Zafaraniyah. It killed three police and three civilians and wounded 40 bystanders, according to a security official.
As dusk fell, a barrage of mortars slammed into a Shi’ite district on the southern edge of Baghdad and killed 11 people, mainly women and children, and wounded 14, an Iraqi defence official said.
North of Baghdad, a suicide car bomber attacked a house in the Khazraj district belonging to an Iraqi army officer, Major Amer Nayif, killing five soldiers and wounding 10, police said.
In Ramadi, two suicide car bombers attacked a house belonging to Sheikh Abdulsattar Abu Risha, the head of a council of Sunni tribal chiefs which opposes al-Qaeda in western Iraq, his deputy Sheikh Hamid al-Hais said.
The first bomb exploded at a police checkpoint protecting the house, while the second hit the building itself. Four police and seven civilians died.
”As displaced families return home peacefully, and hopes are raised by ‘Operation Fardh al-Qanoon’, criminal terrorists are not happy to see life returning to normal in Baghdad,” said Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki.
”Our dear people in Baghdad and across Iraq’s provinces have chosen to go ahead with the political process despite sacrifices,” he said.
”They are determined to stand by our armed forces to encourage them to drive out remnants of the Saddamists and Takfiris and all outlaws,” he said, blaming Sunni extremists and supporters of executed dictator Saddam Hussein.
Last week, Maliki formally announced the start of ”Fardh al-Qanoon” — Operation Imposing Law — a plan that will see tens of thousands of US and Iraqi troops deployed around the capital to try to stem the bloodshed.
”We knew they would strike back and try to get the most damage, the most casualties and the most effect in the media,” said US spokesperson Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Garver.
”We know that they try to foster the circle of sectarian violence, hoping for retaliation by the other side and trying to make it difficult for us to establish security,” he said.
Before the blasts the operation had enjoyed a measure of initial success, and many Baghdadis remain hopeful that a turning point has been reached.
”Yesterday’s [Sunday] bombings were the terrorists’ remaining explosives. They will sooner or later run short of them. The plan has just started. We shouldn’t expect too much,” said Imad Salim, a 49-year-old Kurdish taxi driver.
Soldiers deploying to new security posts in flashpoint districts have met little organised resistance, although two US troops have been killed, and the number of corpses of murder victims found every day has dropped dramatically.
Shi’ite militias, such as the Mahdi Army, appear to have melted away, but the recent bomb attacks show that Sunni insurgent groups such as al-Qaeda remain determined to sow chaos and undermine the US-backed government.
The US is in the process of increasing its 20 000-strong force in Baghdad to 45 000 by May in a bid to assist and motivate a similar number of hard-pressed Iraqi security forces.
”This plan is going to take months,” Garver warned. — AFP
