11 Killed in Iraq Bombings
By VOA News
21 July 2009
Iraqi officials say a series of bombings killed at least 11 people in Baghdad and Ramadi Tuesday, three weeks after Iraqi forces formally assumed security responsibilities in urban areas.
Iraqi Interior Ministry Spokesman General Abdul Karim Khalaf told VOA that Iraqi forces can handle their security duties without the assistance of the U.S. combat forces that withdrew from the cities on June 30. But he said Iraq does need steady support in training and logistics.
In violence Tuesday, police say five bombings killed at least eight people and wounded more than 60 others in Baghdad. Three of those blasts occurred in the Shi'ite neighborhood of Sadr City.
Elsewhere, in Ramadi, the provincial capital of Anbar, a double bombing killed three people. Parts of Anbar were once considered militant strongholds, but tribal leaders and former insurgents have turned against the militants.
There have been multiple deadly attacks in Iraqi cities in the weeks leading up to, and following, the June 30 withdrawal of U.S. combat troops.
Police in the capital say one of the explosions in Baghdad Tuesday was a roadside bomb that targeted the convoy of Iraq's Water Resource Minister Abdul Latif Rasheed. Officials say six civilians were wounded in the attack, but no one in the minister's convoy was hurt.
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