'Many dead' in blast at Baghdad market

Iraqi officials in Baghdad said many people were killed today when an allied air strike hit a busy marketplace.

Witnesses reported 15 burned bodies on the streets of the Shaab district, a popular residential area in the north of the city.

They said it appeared two apartment blocks next to the market had been hit by missiles. There were “many, many casualties”, an Iraqi information ministry official said.

Journalists would be taken to the scene later today, he added.

US and British planes and missiles have been striking Baghdad since the war began last Thursday.