Iraqi Police: Car Bomb in Kirkuk Kills 7
10 August 2007
Iraqi police say a car bomb blast in a market in the northern city of Kirkuk has killed at least seven people and wounded dozens more.
Officials say the attack took place Friday in a mostly Kurdish district of the oil-rich city, where ethnic tensions have been rising in recent days.
South of Baghdad, the U.S. military says two soldiers were injured when an American helicopter was forced to make an emergency landing early Friday in the predominantly Sunni town of Yusifiyah.
The military says the aircraft was providing support to a planned mission when it landed and that the incident is under investigation.
In separate statements, the military said coalition forces killed five terrorists and detained 32 suspects in operations in Baghdad and areas to the north since Thursday.
In Baghdad, thousands of Iraqi police are guarding the city's Kazimiyah district, where hundreds of thousands of Shi'ites converged for an annual pilgrimage to the tomb of a revered Shi'ite imam, Moussa Kadhim. The pilgrimage commemorates the imam's death 12 centuries ago.
Iraqi authorities also banned vehicles from streets until Saturday to prevent attacks by Sunni insurgents during the event.
Last year, snipers killed at least 20 Shi'ites in Baghdad as they walked to the shrine. At the same festival in 2005, an estimated 1,000 pilgrims died in a stampede over a bridge triggered by rumors of a suicide bomber.
Some information for this report was provided by AFP, AP and Reuters.
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