Suicide bombers kill 60 in Iraq attacks

At least 60 people died today as a suicide bomber attacked Iraqi police handing out aid in Baghdad and another bomber struck Iranian pilgrims at a rest stop in Diyala province, according to security sources.

(Note: An earlier version of this article said that the second bomber struck Iranian pilgrims near the countries' border.)

The two attacks bore echoes of the worst violence from Iraq's civil war and was certain to fuel fears that the security strides of the last year and a half were fading away.

The bomber approached a group of national police officers handing out aid to displaced people on a busy street in Baghdad's Karada district, killing 28 people and wounding 54 others, police said.

Squatters living in abandoned government buildings from the late dictator Saddam Hussein's era were standing in line for aid by the police vehicles, witnesses and police sources said.

"I saw some women, children killed and injured. . . . Those people were from the displaced families living in the abandoned buildings and the headquarters of the old Iraqi air force. . . . I saw some dismembered bodies ," said Salah Salim, the 25-year-old owner of a small outdoor stall.

Meanwhile, a suicide bomber killed 32 Iranian pilgrims and wounded 63 others at a rest stop in Muqdadiya in Diyala province, northeast of Baghdad, police said.

Iraqi state television also announced the capture of Abu Omar Baghdadi, the head of the Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella group for armed factions, including Al Qaeda in Iraq.

But an Iraqi security official said the police and army were still awaiting a positive DNA identification of the man. In the past, the Iraqi security forces have announced the detention of militants, including Baghdadi, only to find out later that it was a case of mistaken identity. link...