Winks Blog

34 Killed, 19 Corpses Found

Good afternoon,

BAGHDAD, Iraq - Violence killed at least 34 people including a U.S. soldier as efforts to finish choosing the new Cabinet bogged down Monday in a web of conflicting interests.

The deadliest attack Monday occurred when a car bomb exploded near an Iraqi court in central Baghdad, killing five Iraqi civilians and wounding 10, police Lt. Col. Falah al-Mohammedawi said.

Two Iraqi policemen died and 12 people were wounded when another car bomb went off near a police patrol traveling down busy Palestine Street in eastern Baghdad, police Lt. Ahmed Qassim said.

The American soldier was killed when a roadside bomb struck a military convoy Monday southeast of Baghdad, according to a U.S. statement. The command did not specify the location, but Iraqi police reported a bombing damaged a U.S. convoy between the Shiite holy cities of Karbala and Najaf.

In a separate statement, the U.S. command said one American soldier was killed and another wounded during a clash Sunday near Tal Afar, 260 miles northwest of Baghdad.

The fatalities raised to at least 2,421 the number of U.S. military members who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Two Iraqi television journalists were found dead Monday, a day after they were stopped by men wearing police uniforms on a road southwest of Baghdad, according to Abdul-Karim al-Mehdawi, general manager of Al-Nahrain TV. The bodies of Laith al-Dulaimi and Muazaz Ahmed were taken to a morgue in Kut.

At least 70 journalists have been killed in Iraq since the U.S.-led invasion in March 2003, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists. About three-fourths of them were Iraqis.

At least 19 other bodies were found Monday, including 12 in Baghdad and seven in Kut, according to police. They appeared to have been victims of sectarian death squads.

In other violence Monday:

_ Gunmen stopped a bus carrying Higher Education Ministry employees to work in western Baghdad, killing the driver and wounding a guard, police Capt. Jamil Hussein said.

_ Two gunmen were killed in a clash with Iraqi soldiers in Baghdad's Dora neighborhood.

_ One person was killed and another wounded in a drive-by shooting in a west Baghdad market.

_ A pharmacist was slain in Mosul by gunmen who set fire to his drug store.

Have a nice day.

posted by Wink @ 1:28 PM