Iraq car bomb blasts kills more than 20

KIRKUK More than 20 people were killed in car bomb attacks, as Islamist militants threatened separately to kill 10 people employed by a Turkish-US business and two Americans and one Briton.

A US air strike late on Saturday killed four people and left five wounded in Fallujah, as the US military kept up its campaign of nightly attacks in the Iraqi rebel stronghold, a local hospital said. The US military said a precision strike was carried out on an checkpoint in northern Fallujah operated by gunmen linked to suspected al Qaeda operative Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.More than 400 Iraqis have perished in a wave of suicide bombings and clashes since the start of the month, exacerbating fears over the security situation in the run-up to general elections due to be held in January.In the latest bloodshed, a suicide bomber smashed through the security barriers outside an Iraqi national guard headquarters in Kirkuk, in what was the second major strike in the fractured northern oil city in two weeks, police said.At least 18 people were killed and another 63 wounded, hospital officials said.The vehicle passed through three barriers before it reached the outer gate of the building and exploded, sending shrapnel flying into a crowd of national guard recruits lined up outside.A car bomb also hit a US convoy on the main Baghdad airport road, killing an Iraqi and wounding three soldiers – a scene all too familiar in Iraq, where the health ministry reported 268 killed in the past week alone and another 820 wounded.Within 30 minutes of the attack, a US convoy responding to the emergency was hit by a car bomb, killing two American soldiers.The Baghdad bombings, along with another in the capital Friday that killed five people, was claimed in an Internet message by Zarqawi’s militant Tawhid wal Jihad (Unity and Holy War) organisation.Zarqawi loyalists threatened to kill two Americans and a Briton unless Iraqi women prisoners are freed within 48 hours, according to a videotape broadcast on Al-Jazeera television.The US military said only two Iraqi women, both of them high-security detainees believed to have been instrumental in ousted president Saddam Hussein’s weapons programmes, were being held in the country.- Nampa-AFPThe US military said a precision strike was carried out on an checkpoint in northern Fallujah operated by gunmen linked to suspected al Qaeda operative Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.More than 400 Iraqis have perished in a wave of suicide bombings and clashes since the start of the month, exacerbating fears over the security situation in the run-up to general elections due to be held in January.In the latest bloodshed, a suicide bomber smashed through the security barriers outside an Iraqi national guard headquarters in Kirkuk, in what was the second major strike in the fractured northern oil city in two weeks, police said.At least 18 people were killed and another 63 wounded, hospital officials said.The vehicle passed through three barriers before it reached the outer gate of the building and exploded, sending shrapnel flying into a crowd of national guard recruits lined up outside.A car bomb also hit a US convoy on the main Baghdad airport road, killing an Iraqi and wounding three soldiers – a scene all too familiar in Iraq, where the health ministry reported 268 killed in the past week alone and another 820 wounded.Within 30 minutes of the attack, a US convoy responding to the emergency was hit by a car bomb, killing two American soldiers.The Baghdad bombings, along with another in the capital Friday that killed five people, was claimed in an Internet message by Zarqawi’s militant Tawhid wal Jihad (Unity and Holy War) organisation.Zarqawi loyalists threatened to kill two Americans and a Briton unless Iraqi women prisoners are freed within 48 hours, according to a videotape broadcast on Al-Jazeera television.The US military said only two Iraqi women, both of them high-security detainees believed to have been instrumental in ousted president Saddam Hussein’s weapons programmes, were being held in the country.- Nampa-AFP