More rebel attacks in Iraq as new cabinet discussed

As politicians tried once again today to end a deadlock regarding the formation of Iraq’s new transitional government, the death toll from two co-ordinated militant attacks against Iraqi police and civilians rose to 29.

Meanwhile, insurgents launched another attack on Iraq’s beleaguered oil production, using explosives to set fire to oil pumps used for domestic supplies near Kirkuk, said an official at Northern Oil Company. No injuries were immediately reported.

Yesterday, politicians loyal to Prime Minister-designate Ibrahim al-Jaafari said he was ready to announce a Cabinet that would exclude his interim predecessor, Ayad Allawi.

Al-Jaafari had decided, some members of his political bloc said, to shun further attempts to include members of the party headed by Allawi, the secular Shiite politician who had served as prime minister as the country prepared for elections on January 30.

Members of Allawi’s Iraqi List, which controls 40 seats in the National Assembly, said his party had not been officially informed of the development. Allawi loyalists were bidding for at least four ministries, including a senior government post and a deputy premiership.

“I heard from the media, and some of the other assembly members told me about it,” Hussein Shaalan said late yesterday. But he said the party would continue to support the government even if excluded from the Cabinet.

Al-Jaafari’s list could be submitted to parliament today, some of his bloc said, but others indicated tomorrow was more likely. Many such forecasts have proven wrong so far.

Many Shiites have long resented the secular Allawi, accusing his outgoing administration of having included former members of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party, which brutally repressed the majority Shiites and Kurds.

There had been intense pressure to end the political bickering after a marked recent increase in insurgent violence that many in Iraq blamed on the continuing political turmoil nearly three months after Iraq’s historic parliamentary election.

After the first democratic balloting in a half century, insurgent attacks dropped dramatically. But they have increased dramatically in recent weeks as the politicians failed again and again to name a government.

The New York Times reported today that US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice and US Vice President Dick Cheney, frustrated by the political deadlock, were pushing top Kurdish and Shiite politicians to come together and form a new government.

Yesterday, an emboldened Iraqi insurgency staged carefully co-ordinated dual bombings in Saddam’s hometown of Tikrit, and a Shiite neighbourhood in western Baghdad, killing and wounding dozens of Iraqi police and civilians.

Also, the US military said it had detained four more suspects in the downing of a civilian Mi-8 helicopter on Thursday. All 11 passengers and crew were killed, including a survivor gunned down by insurgents. Ten suspects have been apprehended in all, the military said.

A vehicle packed with explosives was driven into a crowd gathered in front of a popular ice cream shop in Baghdad’s western al-Shoulah neighbourhood yesterday, police Maj. Mousa Abdul Karim said. Minutes later, as police and residents rushed to help the victims, a second suicide car bomber ploughed into the crowd. At least 23 people were killed and 41 wounded, officials at two hospitals said today in an update of the casualty numbers.

Shattered glass, pools of blood, and pieces of flesh littered the scene.

Members of Iraq’s Shiite majority have become a frequent target of Sunni-led insurgents. On Friday, a car bomb ripped through a crowded Shiite mosque in eastern Baghdad during midday prayers, killing 12 people and wounding 22.

n Saddam’s hometown of Tikrit yesterday, two remotely detonated car bombs exploded in quick succession outside a police academy, killing a least six Iraqis and wounding 33, police and a hospital official said. The blasts occurred as recruits were about to leave the station and travel to Jordan for a training, said police Lt. Shalan Allawi.

Insurgents also attacked US forces. A roadside bomb hit one convoy in eastern Baghdad, killing one American soldier and wounding two, the US military said. Iraqi police said two civilians also were wounded in the attack.

An American sailor was killed on Saturday when the Marine convoy he was travelling with was hit by a roadside bomb in Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, the military said.

At least 1,568 members of the US military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Al Qaida in Iraq, the country’s most feared militant group, claimed responsibility for the Tikrit and eastern Baghdad attacks in statements posted on militant websites.

The group also claimed responsibility for a roadside bomb targeting a US patrol near the Abu Ghraib prison, west of Baghdad. The US military said no one was hurt in that attack.

South of the capital, three insurgents were killed yesterday as the roadside bomb they were trying to plant in the town of Mahawil exploded, said police in nearby Hillah.

In Pakistan, a government spokesman said a Pakistan embassy official who was kidnapped in Iraq two weeks ago was freed yesterday. Malik Mohammed Javed was abducted on April 9 after he left his residence in Baghdad to attend prayers at a mosque. The Pakistani government said after his abduction he was in the custody of a previously unknown Islamic militant group, Omar bin al-Khattab that had demanded a ransom for Javed’s release.