Wave of attacks in Baghdad leaves at least 160 dead and 257 injured
César Vallejo | 26.11.2006 19:30 | London
BAGHDAD, November 23.— Six car-bomb explosions and mortar attacks resulted in 160 people killed and 257 injured in a Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City, Baghdad, in one of the bloodies attacks in Iraq since the U.S. invasion of March 2003, ANSA reported.
BAGHDAD, November 23.— Six car-bomb explosions and mortar attacks resulted in 160 people killed and 257 injured in a Shiite neighborhood of Sadr City, Baghdad, in one of the bloodies attacks in Iraq since the U.S. invasion of March 2003, ANSA reported.
Shortly before the explosions, about 100 armed men attacked the Ministry of Health. An evening report referred to seven killed in this assault.
In the evening, the Ministry of the Interior announced that a curfew will be in place indefinitely throughout Baghdad, starting at 8 p.m. local time. The Baghdad and Basora airports were closed indefinitely.
Sadr City is an immense, poor suburb in northeast Baghdad with a population of some 2.5 million people, mostly Shiite Muslims. That branch of Islam is a minority internationally, but 60% of the population in Iraq.
With uncontrolled waves of clashes between Shiite and Sunni Muslims unleashed since the Anglo-American invasion, Sadr City has become one of the main bastions of the militia headed by religious leader Moqtada Sadr.
During a raid by U.S. occupation troops in Sadr City on Thursday morning, four Iraqi civilians in a minibus were killed, according to reports by police, who said the soldiers were responsible.
César Vallejo
