At least 42 killed, 88 injured in Iraq bombings (Roundup)

Jul 9, 2009, 11:08 GMT

Iraqi security forces stand guard at the site of a suicide attack in Tal Afar town near Mosul, about 390 km (240 miles) north of Baghdad, 09 July 2009. A suicide bomber blew up an explosive belt strapped to his body in al-Qala region in Talafar, western Mosul, killing 25 civilians and injuring 50, police said. EPA/NAWRAS AL-TA\'EI

Baghdad - At least 42 people were killed and 88 injured in a series of bombings that targeted high density districts across Iraq on Thursday.

Police sources said that at least 35 people were killed and 63 injured - most of them women and children - in two consecutive suicide bombings in the city of Mosul, some 400 kilometres north of Baghdad.

The bombers detonated their explosives in a crowded street in Tel Afar district, where many Shiite citizens of Turkmen ethnicity congregate, sources told the German Press Agency dpa.

In central Baghdad, meanwhile, six civilians were killed and more than 31 injured when two consecutive bombs exploded in a market in the Shiite district of al-Sadr, according to Qassem Atta, spokesman for the Iraqi security forces in Baghdad.

Sources in the Ministry of Interior said earlier that seven people were killed and several shops were severely damaged. They added that police and army forces cordoned off the scene.

Atta added that Iraqi forces succeeded in defusing a third bomb in the same place.

An Iraqi Turkmen lawmaker said that the attacks aimed at creating a sectarian war in Iraq and shaking its stability. Abbas al-Bayati, a member of the security and defense committee, also believes they want to affect the coming parliamentary elections, scheduled for the end of this year.

'Al-Qaeda militants, remnants of al-Baath party and the Takfiri (excommunicator) religious groups are behind these attacks that took place in Turkmen districts, and other places all over Iraq,' al-Bayati told dpa.

'I think some outer organisations do not want Iraq to be stable, and they are taking advantage of the withdrawal of US troops from these areas with the aim of inciting sectarian war,' he added

'These explosions also target the current preparations for the coming elections in order to embarrass the government and destroy the relationship of trust between the people and the leaders and the parties,' said al-Bayati.

Al-Bayati called on the government to 'improve its intelligence efforts' saying that battles now 'depend on military intelligence' not only guns.

Meanwhile, another lawmaker called on the government to deploy more police and army forces to fill in the security gap in Mosul city.

'Terrorist groups target the weak parts in the city, revealing that there is a huge security gap in these areas; so the Iraqi government should increase forces and declare these districts as disaster stricken areas and pay them compensation,' said MP Haneen al-Qadw.

'Terrorist groups want to prove they still exist and that they are strong, but I believe that they are declining and that Iraqi forces can contain the situation,' he said, adding that he has 'hope and confidence in the abilities of the Iraqi army and police forces,' al- Qadw said.

Mosul, the capital of Nineveh province, has been the scene of near-daily bomb attacks since the US troops withdrew from Iraqi cities and towns on June 30 and despite a government crackdown on suspected militants.

On Tuesday, two car bomb attacks left 27 people dead and 67 injured in two of the city's Shiite districts. In a separate attack in the city centre, seven people, including two policemen, were injured when a militant threw a bomb at a police patrol.