Wave of bombings kills at least 33 in Iraq

BAGHDAD (AP) — A car bomb exploded near a bus station in Baghdad's main Shiite district Wednesday, the deadliest in a series of explosions that killed at least 33 people nationwide, officials said.

The bloodshed came amid growing tensions between the Shiite-led government and minority Sunnis following a deadly security crackdown on a Sunni protest camp in the country's north. Violence has ebbed sharply in Iraq, but a spike in attacks has raised fears about a return of the sectarian bloodshed that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006-2007.

Majority Shiites control the levers of power in post-Saddam Hussein Iraq. Wishing to rebuild the nation rather than revert to open warfare, they have largely restrained their militias over the past five years or so as Sunni extremist groups such as al-Qaida have targeted them with occasional large-scale attacks. An increase attacks against Sunni mosques has fed concerns about a return to retaliatory warfare.

The day began violently when an explosives-laden car parked in the center of the ethnically divided city of Kirkuk at around 3:00 p.m., killing three civilians and wounding eight. An hour later, another parked car bomb exploded in the same area, killing two children and their parents as they were traveling in a car nearby, the city's deputy police chief Maj. Gen. Torhan Abdul-Rahman Youssef said.

Civilians joined forces with rescuers and policemen in searching for survivors in a partially damaged house after the first explosion. A wailing man was repeatedly trying to make his way through to the house, but he was prevented by the crowds. After the second attack, firefighters struggled to extinguish the blaze that engulfed the car with at least three charred bodies of a woman and two children visible.

Kirkuk is home to a mix of Arabs, Kurds and Turkomen, who all have competing claims to the oil-rich area. The Kurds want to incorporate it into their self-rule region in Iraq's north, but Arabs and Turkomen are opposed.

Hours later, several bombs struck within a 90-minute time frame as Iraqis were heading home from work or doing errands in mainly Shiite areas of Baghdad.

The deadliest was in the sprawling slum of Sadr City, an area that saw some of the fiercest fighting between Americans and Shiite militias during the peak of sectarian bloodshed. Police and hospital officials said a car bomb exploded near a crowded bus stop in the area, killing at least seven people and wounding 20. The blast also damaged several shops and cars in the area, which was sealed off by police.

A car bomb also struck firefighters minutes after they arrived on the scene to extinguish a burning car in the mainly Shiite Kazimiyah district in northern Baghdad, killing two and wounding nine others.

Amajad Hussein owns a clothing store and witnessed the blast.

"We ran from the place after the explosion, but we returned to see wounded firefighters on the ground and at least one fire engine in flames," he said. "Once again, the innocent people are paying the price for the security failures in this country."

At least six other bombings occurred in rapid succession near other bus stops or outdoor markets across the Iraqi capital, killing 15 people and wounding nearly 50 people.

In other violence, a suicide bomber on a motorcycle struck a police patrol, killing two officers and wounding eight other people in the town of Tarmiyah, 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of Baghdad, a suicide bomber rammed his motorcycle into a police patrol, killing two policemen and wounding eight other people, a police official said.

Medical officials confirmed the casualty figures for all the attacks. All of the officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to release information.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for Wednesday's attacks, but car and suicide bombings are a hallmark of al-Qaida's Iraq branch.

Insurgents routinely target Iraqi police, government officials and civilians in an attempt to undermine Iraq's government or to exacerbate political tension.

For the past five months, Sunnis have been protesting against what they claim is second-class treatment by the government and to demand an end to some laws they believe unfairly target them. Violence has flared on occasion between security forces and protesters.

But the matter came to a head April 23 after government troops moved against a camp of Sunni demonstrators in the town of Hawija, about 240 kilometers (150 miles) north of Baghdad. The clashes there sparked a wave of violence across Iraq that has killed more than 230 people, posing the most serious threat to Iraq's stability since the last American troops left in December 2011.

Under Saddam, Iraq's Sunni minority held a privileged position, while the Shiites were largely oppressed. But since the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam, those dynamics have been flipped, and a Shiite-led government now holds power in Baghdad.

Authorities also raised the death toll from Tuesday's attack on a row of liquor stores in eastern Baghdad to 12 after one man died of his wounds in the hospital. Families gathered outside a Baghdad morgue to receive the bodies of their relatives. Several wooden caskets were loaded on vehicles as mourners chanted: "There is no God, but Allah."

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Associated Press writer Sinan Salaheddin contributed to this report.

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Turkey says world must act against Syria after bombings

By Jonathon Burch

REYHANLI, Turkey (Reuters) - Turkey said on Sunday it believed fighters loyal to Syrian President Bashar al-Assad were behind twin car bombings that killed 46 people in a Turkish border town.

Foreign Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said those involved in the bombings in Reyhanli on Saturday were thought also to have carried out an attack on the Syrian coastal town of Banias a week ago, in which fighters backing Assad were reported to have killed at least 62 people.

"The attack has nothing to do with the Syrian refugees in Turkey, it's got everything to do with the Syrian regime," Davutoglu said in an interview on TRT television.

"We should be careful against ethnic provocations in Turkey and Lebanon after the Banias massacre," he said.

Syrian Information Minister Omran Zubi denied any Syrian involvement and rejected what he called "unfounded accusations".

The Syrian conflict, now in its third year, has inflamed a confrontation between Sunni and Shi'ite Muslims in the Middle East, with Shi'ite Iran supporting Assad, and Sunni powers like Saudi Arabia backing the rebels.

Banias is a Sunni pocket in the midst of a large Alawite enclave on Syria's Mediterranean coast, and activists in the area accuse militias loyal to Assad, an Alawite, of ethnic attacks.

Reyhanli also has a significant Sunni population, including thousands of Syrians, and has become a logistics base for the rebels fighting Assad just over the border.

(Additional reporting by Ece Toksabay in Istanbul; Writing by Nick Tattersall; Editing by Angus MacSwan)

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Saudi king condemns Boston Marathon bombings

RIYADH, Saudi Arabia (AP) — The king of Saudi Arabia on Tuesday condemned the Boston Marathon bombings, saying no religion or morals would condone such an attack.

In a condolences message to President Barack Obama and the American people, King Abdullah said the perpetrators of such "heinous terrorist acts" are "enemies of any humane considerations." He said the perpetrators represent only themselves.

In a separate statement, the Saudi Embassy said a Saudi woman was among those injured, suffering from minor injuries due to glass fragments.

The Saudi government has been cracking down on Islamic militants since al-Qaida launched a wave of attacks in the country in 2003, killing dozens. It has sought to distance itself from terrorist acts in the past, including the Sept. 11 attacks, where 15 of the 19 hijackers involved were Saudi citizens.

In Washington, a Saudi embassy official said Saudis have not been informed by the U.S. of any Saudi who is considered a person of interest in the Boston Marathon bombings. The official confirmed that a Saudi woman, who was watching the race with her husband and child, was injured by "flying shrapnel."

The official, speaking on condition of anonymity because he wasn't authorized to speak publicly about the investigation, said the woman is not a person of interest and the official has no of information regarding any Saudis who may have been questioned.

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Associated Press writer Bradley Klapper contributed from Washington

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Bombings in Iraq kill 65 a decade after invasion

BAGHDAD (AP) — Insurgents sent a bloody message on the eve of the 10th anniversary of the U.S.-led invasion, carrying out a wave of bombings across the country Tuesday that killed at least 65 people in the deadliest day in Iraq this year.

The nearly 20 attacks, most of them in and around Baghdad, demonstrated in stark terms how dangerously divided Iraq remains more than a year after American troops withdrew. More than 240 people were reported wounded.

It was Iraq's bloodiest day since Sept. 9, when an onslaught of bombings and shootings killed 92.

Violence has ebbed sharply since the peak of Sunni-Shiite fighting that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006 and 2007. But insurgents are still able to stage high-profile attacks, while sectarian and ethnic rivalries continue to tear at the fabric of national unity.

The symbolism of Tuesday's attacks was strong, coming 10 years to the day, Washington time, that President George W. Bush announced the start of hostilities against Iraq. It was already early March 20, 2003, in Iraq when the airstrikes began.

The military action quickly ousted Saddam Hussein but led to years of bloodshed as Sunni and Shiite militants battled U.S. forces and each other, leaving nearly 4,500 Americans and more than 100,000 Iraqis dead.

A decade later, Iraq's long-term stability and the strength of its democracy are uncertain. While the country is freer than it was during Saddam's murderous rule, its Shiite-led government is arguably closer to Tehran than to Washington. It faces an outpouring of anger by the Sunni minority that was dominant under Saddam and at the heart of the insurgency that followed his ouster.

"Today's attacks are new proof that the politicians and security officials are a huge failure," said Hussein Abdul-Khaliq, a resident of Baghdad's Shiite slum district of Sadr City, which was hit by three explosions that killed 10 people, including three commuters on a minibus.

The apparently coordinated attacks around the country included car bombs and explosives stuck to the underside of vehicles. They targeted government security forces and mainly Shiite areas.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility, but Iraqi officials believe al-Qaida's Iraq arm is to blame. The terror group favors car bombs and coordinated bombings to undermine public confidence in the government. It has claimed it was behind two large-scale, well-coordinated attacks already this month, including an assault on the Justice Ministry in downtown Baghdad last week that left 30 dead.

Sabah al-Nuaman, a spokesman for Iraq's counterterrorism services, said al-Qaida is trying to exploit political instability in the country. He also linked the violence to the civil war across the border in Syria, where largely Sunni rebels — some with ties to al-Qaida — are trying to topple President Bashar Assad.

"The terrorist groups are trying to move their operations back to Iraq. They want to make Iraq part of the regional struggle," al-Nuaman said.

The violence started around 8 a.m., when a bomb exploded outside a popular restaurant in Baghdad's Mashtal neighborhood, killing four people, according to police and hospital officials. It blew out the eatery's windows and left several cars mangled in the blood-streaked street.

The deadliest attack was a 10 a.m. car bombing near the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs in Baghdad's Qahira neighborhood. Seven people were killed.

Another car bomb exploded outside a restaurant near one of the main gates to the fortified Green Zone, which houses major government offices and the U.S. and British embassies. Six people died, including two soldiers. Thick black smoke could be seen rising from the area as ambulances raced to the scene.

At one point amid the chaos, authorities shut bridges spanning the Tigris River in the capital, hoping to thwart further attacks.

Car bombings, roadside blasts, suicide attacks and other mayhem were reported in other parts of the capital as well as in Taji, Tarmiyah, Baqouba and Iskandiriya. In the northern city of Mosul, a local police commander was killed along with two bodyguards by a suicide bomber.

The U.S. and Britain, the two countries that contributed the bulk of the troops for the 2003 war effort, condemned the attacks.

"The vast majority of Iraqis want to leave behind the violence of the past to build a peaceful and prosperous country," British Foreign Secretary William Hague said in a statement.

Amid the political tensions, Iraq's Cabinet decided Tuesday to postpone next month's local elections in two provinces dominated by Sunnis.

Anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr blasted the decision and threatened to withdraw his bloc's support from the government.

"Staying in this government has become harmful and not useful at all," he said.

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Associated Press writers Sameer N. Yacoub, Qassim Abdul-Zahra and Sinan Salaheddin in Baghdad, and Raphael Satter in London contributed to this report.

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Follow Adam Schreck on Twitter at http://twitter.com/adamschreck

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