More Bloodshed in Baghdad: At Least 121 Dead, Hundreds Wounded
Posted By Vicki McClure Davidson on December 8, 2009
Iraqi security forces and rescuers search for survivors at the site of a bomb attack near the new Finance Ministry in Baghdad | Photo credit: Khalid Mohammed-AP
In the months leading up to the country’s March 6 elections, it is feared that more bombings and more death are in store for the Iraqi people. Authorities believe the al Qaeda terrorist group is responsible for these horrifying attacks, although no group has taken credit.
From New York Times, Coordinated Bombings in Baghdad Kill at Least 121:
By Steven Lee Myers and Mark Santora
December 8, 2009BAGHDAD — A series of devastating car bombings rocked Baghdad on Tuesday, killing at least 121 people and wounding hundreds more, according to preliminary accounts by witnesses, the police and hospital officials.
Five bombs in all, including at least three suicide attacks, struck near a college, a court complex in western Baghdad, a mosque and a market and a neighborhood near the Interior Ministry in what appeared to be a coordinated assault on the capital.
The blasts began shortly after 10 a.m. and reverberated through the city for the next 50 minutes, sending enormous plumes of black smoke into the air.
The attacks came as Iraq’s Presidency Council announced a date — March 6 — for the country’s long-delayed parliamentary elections. And furor over Tuesday’s bombings immediately became political, with prospective candidates blaming the security forces and the government of Prime Minister Nuri Kamal al-Maliki for failing, once again, to secure the heart of Baghdad.
Many victims linked the attacks to the protracted political jockeying over holding the election, which was originally scheduled for January. “Are we cursed?” yelled a young woman near the mosque that was struck in Qahira, in northeast Baghdad. She had burns over her arms and legs. “When will we be finished with this election issue?”
The attacks were the worst in Iraq since twin suicide bombings destroyed three ministries on Oct. 25, killing at least 155 people. They fit a pattern of spectacular attacks in the capital, followed by weeks of relative calm. In August, two suicide car bombs exploded near the country’s Finance and Foreign Ministries, killing at least 122.
Those attacks became known as Bloody Sunday and Bloody Wednesday, respectively. Across the city, officials and ordinary Iraqis added the adjective to Tuesday, as well. All of them illustrated the shortcomings of Iraq’s security forces, which despite an overwhelming presence at checkpoints across the city, appear unable to stop carefully orchestrated terrorist operations.
“There is no explanation at all for such a horrible security failure,” said Muhammad al-Shalam, a Sunni member of Baghdad’s Provincial Council, which met on Tuesday in a building damaged in October. “The security forces are totally responsible for all this blood.”
One of the deadliest of Tuesday’s bombings occurred at a compound in western Baghdad that includes the Cassation Court, which handles appeals and which moved to the area after the attack in October. A suicide bomber plowed his car through the main checkpoint leading into the compound and denoted explosives hidden inside. The attack occurred near Zawra Park, which includes the city’s zoo and amusement areas.
Among dozens killed there were several judges, a spokesman for the Supreme Judicial Council, Abdul Sattar al-Biriqdar, said in an interview. The court buildings were severely damaged.
The office of a former prime minister, Ayad Allawi, was 300 yards from the blast; its windows were shattered, its doors wrenched from their jambs.
A spokeswoman for Mr. Allawi, who has announced a political coalition with a senior secular Sunni leader, Salih al-Mutlaq, released a statement on their behalf denouncing the failure of Mr. Maliki’s government to stop the bombings.
“The government always forms investigation committees after each explosion, but it comes up with nothing later,” the spokeswoman said.
U.S. soldier walks past a burned bus at bomb attack site in northern Baghdad on Dec. 8. Car bombs killed more than 121 people in the heart of the Iraqi capital on Tuesday, despite a security crackdown after recent high-profile attacks | Photo credit: Thaier Al-sudani-REUTERS
From Washington Post, At least 112 dead in string of Baghdad bomb attacks:
Officials warn of increased violence leading up to elections March 6
December 8, 2009
BAGHDAD — A series of bombings apparently targeting educational facilities and other crowded areas killed scores of people Tuesday morning in Baghdad.
Authorities said at least 112 people were killed and 425 were wounded. At least five bombings were reported, with the explosives detonating minutes apart, starting about 10:15 a.m.
The violence marred a week during which the government had hoped two positive developments — the passing of an election law on Sunday and the upcoming auction of oil field contracts to foreign companies — would dominate headlines. Iraq’s three-member presidential council voted Tuesday to schedule parliamentary elections March 6, a seven-week delay from the original date, after months of wrangling over how the balloting will work.
Iraqi and American officials say insurgents probably will try to continue attacks in the months leading up to the elections.
One bomb on Tuesday apparently targeted a courthouse in Mansour district, in central Baghdad. Another bombing was reported near Mustansiriya University, one of the country’s most prominent colleges. Another one, in Waziryia, detonated close to the Judicial Institute, a complex where judges are trained.
In the southwestern neighborhood of Dora, a suicide bombing was reported at a technical institute for engineers.
From Xinhua, Italy condemns Baghdad blasts:
ROME, Dec. 8 (Xinhua) — Italian Foreign Minister Franco Frattini on Tuesday condemned the bomb blasts that happened earlier in Baghdad killing at least 127 people and wounding some 448 others.
In a message to his Iraqi counterpart Hoshyar Zebari, Frattini called the attacks “barbaric acts” aimed at undermining the Iraqi government’s efforts to consolidate institutions and promote stability and democracy.
Italy’s support for the Iraqi government will “never waver,” the foreign minister said.
From Christian Science Monitor, Baghdad bombings: Iraqis demand security:
Iraqi soldiers and police quickly sealed off major roads around the blast sites as relatives pleaded to be let through.
“My son is at school. I don’t know if he’s dead or alive,” an off-duty Defense Ministry employee begged an Iraqi soldier. He said he had been trying all the phone numbers for his 4-year-old son’s kindergarten for the past hour and a half.
Although one of the blasts shattered windows in the kindergarten in Baghdad’s Mansour district, parents later said the children were unhurt. The attack was aimed at a nearby court building, where Iraqi officials on the scene said a suicide bomber drove his van, packed with plastic explosives, through a security barrier, and exploded it in the parking lot.
[...]
Surveying the scene of the Mansour bombing, Interior Ministry spokesman Qassim al-Atta said the attacks were the work of Al Qaeda in Iraq and Baathists loyal to executed leader Saddam Hussein.
The coordinated bombings were the biggest since suicide vehicles exploded outside the Justice Ministry and the Baghdad governorate building in October, killing at least 150 people. In August, suicide bombers struck the Foreign and Finance ministries, killing more than 100.
[...]
US troops on the ground, called in by the Iraqis to help with gathering forensic evidence and securing the sites, were more visible than they have been in other major bombings since the US withdrew its troops from cities this summer.
US helicopters, some firing flares to deflect missiles, kept watch overheard.
Near the court building, a minibus of school children who were evacuated from a nearby school waited for their parents to pick them up.
Mohammad, who is 12, said they had all been frightened when the glass shattered in their school but that none of his classmates had been hurt.
Other alarming news:
ABC News: Massive TSA Security Breach As Agency Gives Away Its Secrets
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