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75 Killed in Iraq Blasts

By VOA News
23 April 2009

Two major suicide bombings in Iraq have claimed the lives of at least 75 people, one of the most violent days in the country in more than a year.

In the deadliest attack Thursday, a bomber detonated explosives in a restaurant in Muqdadiya in Diyala province. Police say at least 47 people were killed, many of them Iranian Shi'ite pilgrims.

In Baghdad, police say at least 28 people were killed in a blast that targeted a security patrol near Baghdad's Tahariyat Square. Officials say the police were distributing aid to displaced families when the bomber blew himself up. Security officials and children are reported among the dead.

Separately, the Associated Press reported Thursday that the Iraqi government has counted more than 87,000 Iraqis who have been killed in violence since 2005. The news agency said it received the information from a government official who requested anonymity.

Also Thursday, authorities in Baghdad announced the capture of a top Sunni insurgent.

A security spokesman, General Qassem Mohammed Atta, said Thursday Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, said to lead the al-Qaida-linked Islamic State of Iraq, was arrested in Baghdad.

Iraqi authorities in the past have announced the arrest or killing of major insurgent leaders, only to later say the reports were false.

In Washington, Pentagon spokesman, Bryan Whitman, said that if the report is true, it would be very good news. He said he had no reason to doubt the information, but that the U.S. was trying to confirm it.

A U.S. military commander, General Kevin Bergner, has previously said al-Baghdadi is a fictional character. Bergner and others believe he was created by Egyptian-born insurgent Abu Ayyub al-Masri to put an Iraqi face on the otherwise foreign leadership of al-Qaida in Iraq.

Much of the recent violence has been blamed on Sunni insurgents.

The Iraqi security spokesman said both blasts Thursday bore the hallmarks of al-Qaida in Iraq.

The attacks also wounded more than 100 other people.

After months of declining violence, suicide bombers have struck repeatedly in the past several weeks. The upsurge coincides with a planned drawdown of U.S. troops from Iraq, and preparations for national elections later this year.

Some information for this report was provided by AFP and Reuters.