Surge of sectarian violence leaves 20 dead in Iraq

THREE back-to-back explosions killed 20 people and wounded more than 70 last night in a mostly Shi’ite neighbourhood in southern Baghdad, police said.

The first blast occurred when a rocket struck an apartment building in the Zafraniyah neighbourhood, police Lt Thaer Mahmoud said.

About 10 minutes later, a car bomb exploded as police and bystanders rushed to the scene, he said. A bomb strapped to a motorcycle went off in the same area minutes later, he said.

First reports said eight people were killed in the rocket attack and 12 in the two other blasts, he said, adding that more than 70 were wounded.

The multiple attacks appeared part of the grisly pattern of Sunni-Shi’ite violence which American officials consider the greatest threat to Iraq’s stability more than three years after the US-led invasion toppled Saddam Hussein’s regime.

US commanders are sending nearly 12,000 US and Iraqi soldiers into the capital to curb the surge of sectarian violence.

Earlier yesterday, the US command announced that soldiers of the 2nd Brigade, 101st Arborne Division had arrested a “key terrorist cell leader” who was “directly linked” to the July 17 attack on an outdoor market in Mahmoudiya, about 20 miles south of Baghdad.

Also yesterday, Iraq’s health minister, aligned to a major Shi’ite militia, claimed US forces arrested seven of his personal guards in a surprise pre-dawn raid on his office.

The US military command, however, said five people were detained from the ministry building in connection with the kidnapping of Iraqis.

Health minister Ali al-Shemari said the soldiers arrived at 3am, broke open doors inside the building leading to his office and hauled away the seven men, who were posted there as night guards.

“There was no legal warrant, there was no prior warning to the ministry, there was no reason to arrest them. It is a provocation,” said al-Shemari, a Shi’ite aligned to the anti-US radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, who heads Iraq’s biggest Shiite militia, the Mahdi Army.

He said it appeared the seven men were arrested on false accusations made by unknown people.

However, a US military statement said coalition forces received a tip that “15 criminals wearing Iraqi army uniforms” had kidnapped six people and taken them to the Ministry of Health building.

Iraqi and US soldiers searched the building and did not find any kidnap victims. But five detainees were taken in for questioning, said the statement.