Car bomb kills 43

A car bomb blast during a funeral ceremony today in the Shiite holy city of Najaf killed 30 people and injured 65, a hospital official said.

The blast rocked an area near central Najaf’s Maidan Square, close to the revered Imam Ali shrine compound, as a large crowd of people gathered to watch a funeral procession for a tribal sheikh pass by.

Youssef Munim, head of the statistics department at Najaf’s al-Hakim Hospital, said 30 people were killed by the explosion and 65 were wounded.

Abd-A’al al-Kufi, head of Najaf police’s quick reaction force, confirmed that the blast was caused by a car bomb.

“A car bomb exploded near us,” said Najaf provincial governor Adnan al-Zurufi, who was standing alongside the city’s police chief when the explosion detonated about 100 yards away.

“I saw about 10 people killed. Some were blown up and there were some injured and carried to the hospitals.”

Najaf police chief Ghalib al-Jazaari believed he and al-Zurufi were the targets of the attack, which occurred at about 11.45am Irish time.

“As I and the governor were waiting for the funeral processions three explosions occurred,” al-Jazaari said. ”We were targeted.”

“There are victims who are from the civilians and not from out bodyguards or the police,” he added.

A witness said he saw locals pull at least six slain people and one wounded person from several shops damaged by the blasts, which rocked the holy city, located 100 miles south of Baghdad, and sent a black plume of smoke rising into the sky.

Fifteen-year-old Khalid Jabar, who works in a café near the blast site, lost his left leg in the blast.

“I was working in the café when I heard a big explosion,” Jabar said from his al-Hakin Hospital bed. “I felt that I was hit by an electric shock. Then I saw my left leg on the ground.”

The explosion happened 400yds from the shrine of Imam Ali in Najaf, a one of the holiest in Iraq.

In an apparently related attack, a suicide car bomber exploded his vehicle near the main bus station in Karbala, another Shiite stronghold 45 miles north-west of Najaf.

Hospital officials said 13 people were killed and 30 injured in that attack.