Iraqi car bomb kills 13

BAGHDAD – A car bomb shattered a convoy of Westerners in Baghdad, killing at least 13 people, including three General Electric Co workers and two bodyguards.

Crowds rejoiced over the attack, dancing around a charred body yesterday, dozens of angry Shiites gathered in Firdous Square for the funeral of six Iraqi Shiite truck drivers whose bodies were found the day before in Ramadi. Mourners said the men were butchered by Sunni extremists in Fallujah after police handed them over to insurgents.If true, the incident raises further questions about the capability of the Iraqi police to handle security in the country as the Americans lower their profile following the hand-over of sovereignty June 30.Also near Fallujah, a roadside bomb hit a 20-vehicle American convoy of Humvees and trucks late Monday, witnesses said, and it could not be determined if there were casualties.In Kut, southeast of Baghdad, authorities said attackers hurled two grenades late Monday at an American patrol in the city’s Damook district.One Iraq on a motorcycle was wounded in the crossfire, witnesses said.The car bomb in Baghdad exploded during the morning rush hour Monday near busy Tahrir Square as three SUVs carrying the contractors were passing through.The blast destroyed eight vehicles and turned nearby shops and a two-story house to rubble.It was the second vehicle bombing in the capital in as many days amid an upsurge of bloodshed in the city only two weeks before the formal end of the U.S.-led occupation.Iraq’s interior minister said he believed foreigners carried out the attack, and Prime Minister Iyad Allawi accused Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi of trying to disrupt the transfer of sovereignty.Al-Zarqawi, believed to have contacts with al-Qaida, is accused in last month’s decapitation of American Nicholas Berg.During the funeral service at Firdous Square, mourners said the drivers were hired by Iraqi contractors to take tents to the Fallujah brigade, organized last month to assume security from the Marines in the rebellious city west of Baghdad.The drivers were stopped June 5 on their way back to Baghdad by armed men.Some drivers escaped and made their way to a police station, where officers handed them over to a Muslim preacher, who refused to let them go because they were Shiites, mourners said.One man, Alaa Mery, said that on June 8, he went to Fallujah to negotiate for the hostages’ release.He said he met with some Syrians who identified themselves as members of the extremist Wahhabist sect and said they were holding the drivers because they collaborated with the Americans.The Syrians demanded US$3 000 for each of the missing men, he said.The families could not afford the ransom.”Fallujah clerics and people made a big fuss regarding Abu Ghraib torture, but now they are killing and mutilating Muslims,” Mery said, referring to the American abuse of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison.”They are not resistance.They are a copy of Saddam.”Police Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman confirmed that seven truck drivers were killed in the Fallujah area.The discrepancy in the numbers could not be explained.There was no explanation why the Fallujah police handed over the men to an extremist cleric rather than provide them protection.- Nampa-APMourners said the men were butchered by Sunni extremists in Fallujah after police handed them over to insurgents.If true, the incident raises further questions about the capability of the Iraqi police to handle security in the country as the Americans lower their profile following the hand-over of sovereignty June 30.Also near Fallujah, a roadside bomb hit a 20-vehicle American convoy of Humvees and trucks late Monday, witnesses said, and it could not be determined if there were casualties.In Kut, southeast of Baghdad, authorities said attackers hurled two grenades late Monday at an American patrol in the city’s Damook district.One Iraq on a motorcycle was wounded in the crossfire, witnesses said.The car bomb in Baghdad exploded during the morning rush hour Monday near busy Tahrir Square as three SUVs carrying the contractors were passing through.The blast destroyed eight vehicles and turned nearby shops and a two-story house to rubble.It was the second vehicle bombing in the capital in as many days amid an upsurge of bloodshed in the city only two weeks before the formal end of the U.S.-led occupation.Iraq’s interior minister said he believed foreigners carried out the attack, and Prime Minister Iyad Allawi accused Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi of trying to disrupt the transfer of sovereignty.Al-Zarqawi, believed to have contacts with al-Qaida, is accused in last month’s decapitation of American Nicholas Berg.During the funeral service at Firdous Square, mourners said the drivers were hired by Iraqi contractors to take tents to the Fallujah brigade, organized last month to assume security from the Marines in the rebellious city west of Baghdad.The drivers were stopped June 5 on their way back to Baghdad by armed men.Some drivers escaped and made their way to a police station, where officers handed them over to a Muslim preacher, who refused to let them go because they were Shiites, mourners said.One man, Alaa Mery, said that on June 8, he went to Fallujah to negotiate for the hostages’ release.He said he met with some Syrians who identified themselves as members of the extremist Wahhabist sect and said they were holding the drivers because they collaborated with the Americans.The Syrians demanded US$3 000 for each of the missing men, he said.The families could not afford the ransom.”Fallujah clerics and people made a big fuss regarding Abu Ghraib torture, but now they are killing and mutilating Muslims,” Mery said, referring to the American abuse of Iraqis at the Abu Ghraib prison.”They are not resistance.They are a copy of Saddam.”Police Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman confirmed that seven truck drivers were killed in the Fallujah area.The discrepancy in the numbers could not be explained.There was no explanation why the Fallujah police handed over the men to an extremist cleric rather than provide them protection.- Nampa-AP