Bulletin de liaison et d'information - Institut kurde de Paris

Revue de Presse-Press Review-Berhevoka Çapê-Rivista Stampa-Dentro de la Prensa-Baszn Ozeti
Attacks targeting Iraqi forces kill 36
By Kirk Semple
BAGHDAD: Four separate attacks
aimed at Iraqi soldiers or police officers
killed at least 36 people Tuesday and
wounded at least 45, officials said, as
American and Iraqi generals continued
to shift security forces to Baghdad as
part of their retooled strategy to roll
back surging violence in the capital.
In the deadliest of those attacks, a
powerful improvised bomb exploded
before dawn next to a bus carrying Iraqi
troops from Mosul to Baghdad, Iraqi
military officials reported. At least 23
soldiers were killed and 20 were
wounded in the blast, which occurred
near the Sunni Arab bastion of Tikrit,
Saddam Hussein's hometown.
Several hours later, a suicide bomber
drove a sedan packed with explosives toward
a naghdad bank where Iraqi troops
were collecting their monthly pay, but
the vehicle exploded before it reached
its apparent target when soldiers
opened fire on it, military officials said.
The attack killed at least 5people - 4
civilians and 1 soldier - and wounded
at least 14,including 8 civilians, according
to the Ministry of Defense.
Loqman Shikhan, the owner of a musical
instrument store several blocks
away from the bomb site, said he had
seen bloodied victims lying in the street
and calling for help but receiving none
"because people thought there might be
another bomb waiting to explode."
Insurgents seeking maximum
ramage sometimes rletonate secondary
bombs after rescue crews have arrived
at an attack sÎte.
President George W. Bush and Prime
Minister Nüri Kamal al-Maliki announced
an agreement last week to significantly
strengthen military presence
in Baghdad. The plan calls for adding at
least 4,000 U.S. soldiers and 4,000 Iraqi
security troops in the capital.
There are now 9,000 U.S. troops,
8,500 Iraqi soldiers and 34,500 Iraqi police
officers involved in security operations
in Baghdad, according to military
officials.
The cycle of sectarian bloodshed has
steadily worsened in recent months,
particularly in the capital, in spite of
Maliki's original security plan, which
he instituted shortly after he was installed
in office in late May.
According to statistics from the Iraqi
government and collated by the United
. Nations, an average of more than 100 civilians
a day were killed in June, many
in the capital.
Much of the recent violence has been
driven by sectarian death squads, including
Sunni insurgents seeking to topple
the national government, and by Shiite
militiamen operating under the cover of
Iraq's Shiite-controlled security forces.
w~ Mohammed JalillEuropean Pressphoto Agency
An Iraqi soldier guarding the scene of a suicide car bombing Tuesday in the Karrada
district of Baghdad.The attack killed at least 5 people and wounded at least 14others.
The suicide car bomb attack in Baghdad
on Tuesday occurred on a busy commercial
street in the predominantly
Shiite, middle-class neighborhood of
Karrada, on the east side of the Tigris
River opposite the fortified Green Zone.
H was the second car bomb in five
days on that street, which runs through
the center of a district that, until recently,
had not seen the level of violence
that has plagued other neighborhoods.
But the latest attack shattered any
lingering notion among residents and
shop owners that the neighborhood was
a bastion of calm.
"The situation is very bad and this
street is very dangerous now, but we
have no remedy," said Shikhan, the music
store owner. "We have to work to
feed our families."
In another deadly attack against Iraqi
security forces Tuesday, a car bomb apparently
rigged to explode next to an
Iraqi police patrol near the main hospital
in the troubled town of Muqdadiya,
north of Baghdad, killed five civilians
and a policeman, according to the police
in Diyala Province.
In Kirkuk, an improvised bomb exploded
next to a police convoy, killing
two officers, said Captain Firhad Aziz
of the Kirkuk police.
Elsewhere in Iraq, bombs, ambushes
and street dashes left at least 3 people
dead and 13wounded, the police said.
Separately, a cameraman for an Iranian
television channel was killed in the
Amariya neighborhood of Baghdad, said
a Ministry ofInterior official.
In an U.S. military courtroom in
Tikrit, a hearing began Tuesday to
weigh the evidence against four soldiers
accused of killing three Iraqi detainees
during an operation against insurgents
in May. The soldiers are
accused of releasing the three Iraqis -
suspected insurgents detained in a region
north of Baghdad - and shooting
the men as they fled.
The hearing will determine whether
enough evidence exists to recommend
that the four soldiers face full courtsmartial.
The New York Times
Reporting for this article was contributed
by Sahar Nageeb and Qais Mizher
from Baghdad, an Iraqi employee of The
New York Times from Kirkuk, and Paul
von Zielbauer from Forward Operating
Base Speicher, Iraq.
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August 2, 2006
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