Triple Car Bomb Rocks Baghdad Market
A triple car bombing struck a food market in a predominantly Shiite area in central Baghdad on Saturday, killing at least 51 people a day after a U.S.-Iraqi raid against Sunni insurgents in a nearby neighborhood.
Three parked cars blew up nearly simultaneously as shoppers were buying fruit, vegetables, meat and other items for dinner in the busy al-Sadriyah district.
The blast sent clouds of black smoke over concrete high-rises in the area, which has narrow alleys that made it difficult for ambulances and fire trucks to navigate. At least 51 people were killed and 90 wounded, according to police Lt. Mohammed Khayoun and hospital officials.
Nobody claimed responsibility for the attack, but it followed a raid on Friday by Iraqi forces backed by U.S. helicopters targeting Sunni insurgents in al-Fadhil, less than half a mile away.
A bombing and mortar attack also killed 215 people and wounded more than 200 in the Shiite district of Sadr City in Baghdad on Nov. 23 as sectarian tensions increase.
The Sunni Association of Muslim Scholars in Iraq condemned the al-Fadhil raid in a statement Saturday, alleging that six people were killed and 13 detained.
Iraqi police said Friday that one Iraqi soldier and two civilians were killed in the fighting, and the U.S. military said 28 people were detained.
Separately, U.S. and Iraqi forces began an offensive operation in Baqouba, the capital of Diyala province about 35 miles northeast of Baghdad, where fighting has raged for a week between Sunni insurgents and police, the U.S. command said.
At least 36 suspected militants were detained during one pre-dawn raid in Baqouba, police said. Later in the day, state-run Iraqiya television said one al Qaeda in Iraq insurgent was killed and 43 detained, including two foreigners.
Saturday's operation was launched two days after the U.S. military said Baqouba was fully operational, despite media reports that fighting had cleared its streets of cars and pedestrians.
Clashes also broke out Saturday between insurgents and U.S troops in the predominantly Sunni city of Duluiyah 45 miles north of Baghdad, police Capt. Qassim Mohammed said.
A leading Shiite politician reviled by Sunni Arabs for his close ties with Iran and a militia blamed for sectarian violence flew to the United States where he was expected to reassure President George W. Bush on the thorny question of Iranian influence in Iraq.
Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, who is due to meet with Mr. Bush on Monday, dismissed speculation that his White House talks posed a threat to the authority of beleaguered Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki, who came under criticism for meeting with Mr. Bush in Jordan on Thursday.
"This trip to Washington was planned a long time ago and has nothing to do with the meetings that took place in Amman," al-Hakim, leader of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, or SCIRI, Iraq's largest Shiite party, told reporters in Amman, Jordan.
Al-Hakim is arguably the most powerful Shiite politician in Iraq, but he prefers to play a behind-the-scenes role. He wanted a close SCIRI associate, Adil Abdul-Mahdi, to be prime minister after elections in December, but grudgingly accepted al-Maliki as a compromise candidate. The two men, however, have maintained a public image of cooperation to safeguard the unity of their United Iraqi Alliance, the dominant partner in the ruling coalition.
The speculation that al-Hakim was emerging as a rival for Washington's attention, was fueled in part by an internal White House memo recently leaked to the media that questioned al-Maliki's authority and his ability to handle Iraq's worsening security.
Written by National Security Adviser Stephen J. Hadley after he met al-Maliki in Baghdad, the memo also spoke of the need for the Iraqi leader to end his alliance with anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose militia, the Mahdi Army, is blamed for much of Iraq's sectarian violence.
The timing of al-Hakim's meeting with Mr. Bush — four days after the U.S. leader met al-Maliki — has raised the possibility that Washington may also be looking for additional sources of help as it steps up its search for ways to stabilize Iraq, allowing a drawdown on U.S. forces to begin.
President Bush's pledges of support for al-Maliki and his Monday meeting with al-Hakim also coincide with an ongoing debate within his administration on whether to abandon efforts to persuade Sunni Arabs to halt their insurgency and instead leave that task to the Shiites and Kurds, according to U.S. officials familiar with the re-evaluation process.
Some U.S. officials have argued that the outreach to the Sunnis has failed and may be alienating the majority Shiites who, together with minority Kurds, have been Washington's most reliable allies in Iraq. In what maybe a last-ditch effort, a senior U.S. administration official said Mr. Bush will meet in January with Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, a hard-line Sunni Arab who has been very critical of al-Maliki.
Two al-Maliki aides and third close to al-Hakim said the prime minister and the SCIRI leader had discussed the White House visit. The aides, who spoke on condition of anonymity in exchange for disclosing confidential information, said al-Hakim was expected to try to persuade Mr. Bush to engage U.S. adversary Iran in the search for a solution in Iraq. In return, they said, al-Hakim would pledge not to allow Iran to use him to promote its own interests, said by analysts to be "controlled chaos" that keeps the United States preoccupied with Iraq.
Al-Hakim has close links with Shiite Iran, where he lived in exile for years before he returned to Iraq after the 2003 ouster of Saddam Hussein's Sunni-led regime. His Badr Brigade militia, trained and armed by the Iranians, is blamed for some of the sectarian violence in Iraq.
Badr, however, has mostly stayed out of the limelight, leaving the media and U.S. officials to focus on another Shiite militia, the less disciplined and less secretive Mahdi Army.
Al-Hakim's militia links and close ties to Iran, however, have apparently been ignored by Washington, perhaps in recognition of the potential of his political leverage and his close friendship with spiritual leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.