At Least Six Killed in Baghdad Car Bombing

BAGHDAD, Iraq – A car bomb exploded in an upscale shopping district of Baghdad on Monday, killing at least six Iraqis and setting fire to an apartment building, in a surge of violence that has left at least 127 people dead since a new government was formed last week.

Striking back at the insurgency, U.S. and Iraqi forces detained 52 suspected insurgents in the Diyarah area south of Baghdad on Monday, the military said. A car bomb in the area killed two U.S. soldiers Friday.

The skyrocketing attacks are blamed on an insurgency believed largely made up of members of the disaffected Sunni Arab minority, who dominated Iraq for decades under Saddam Hussein but were mainly shut out of a partial new Cabinet announced Thursday.

Meanwhile, with the new government due to be sworn in on Tuesday, incoming Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari has filled six of the seven Cabinet seats that were left undecided last week, an aide, Laith Kuba, said Monday. But disputes remained over the key defense ministry portfolio, which is destined for a Sunni.

Since Thursday, when Iraq’s interim government finally appointed a partial Cabinet after three months of political infighting, at least 127 people, including 11 Americans, have been killed in a slew of bombings, ambushes and other attacks.

The worst toll in the recent spate of violence came Sunday when a car bomb exploded in Tal Afar, 90 miles east of the Syrian border, killing 25 and wounding more than 50 people gathered for the funeral of a Kurdish Democratic Party official, U.S. and Iraqi officials said.

Deputy provincial Governor Khisru Goran, who also serves as a KDP spokesman in nearby Mosul, said the car plowed into the funeral tent and exploded, but the U.S. military said it was not a suicide attack.

U.S. and Iraqi forces imposed a curfew in Tal Afar on Monday and were preventing vehicles from entering or leaving the city, Goran said.

In Monday’s worst attack, a car bomb exploded in an upscale shopping district in southern Baghdad and set fire to a six-story apartment. At least three cars parked nearby were also destroyed, said police Lt. Ali Hussein.

As firefighters fought the blaze, thick black smoke and flames rose from the ground floor.

Six civilians were killed and seven wounded in the explosion, which missed a police patrol in the area, said police Lt. Col. Salman Abdul Karim al-Fartosi.

In eastern Baghdad, a car bomb exploded near a passport office, killing three Iraqis, including two policemen, and wounding six, said police Lt. Col. Hassan Chalob said.

Elsewhere in Baghdad, Maj. Gen. Rashid Feleih, commander of a special Interior Ministry security force, escaped unhurt when a roadside bomb hit his four-car convoy, damaging one vehicle, said police Maj. Mousa Abdul Karim.

Another roadside bomb exploded near a U.S. military patrol in northern Baghdad, but no Americans were hurt, said U.S. Army Master Sgt. Greg Kaufman.

A British soldier from the 12th Mechanized Brigade also died Monday of injures sustained during fighting at al-Amara in southern Iraq, the Ministry of Defense said in London. No further details were released. A total of 87 British troops have been killed in Iraq since the war started in 2003.

In northern Iraq, a woman was killed when a car bomb exploded near a U.S. military convoy east of Yarmuk, a hospital official said. Four other civilians were wounded and remained in critical condition at al-Jamhuri Hospital in nearby Mosul, said Dr. Baha al-Din al-Batri.

The U.S. military said it had received reports of an explosion in the area, but had no details.

In Mosul, 225 miles northwest of Baghdad, a roadside bomb targeting an Iraqi army patrol wounded two soldiers, the U.S. military said.

Despite the heavy toll, Iraq’s national security adviser said Sunday the fledgling government was making progress against the insurgents.

“There is no shadow of doubt in my mind that by the end of the year, we would have achieved a lot,” Mouwafak al-Rubaie said in an interview with CNN’s “Late Edition.”"Probably the back of the insurgency has already been broken.”

Coalition forces have raided a number of insurgent strongholds in recent weeks, detaining suspected militants and confiscating hidden arms caches, the U.S. military said.

Separately, Romania’s President Traian Basescu said Monday he is certain that three Romanian journalists kidnapped in Baghdad on March 28 are alive, even though their captors threatened last week to kill them if his country failed to withdraw its 800 troops from Iraq.

Basescu said authorities were doing all they could to free the journalists – Ovidiu Ohanesian, Marie-Jeanne Ion and Sorin Miscoci. He made no mention of their Iraqi-American translator, Mohammed Monaf, who was kidnapped with them.

More than 200 foreigners have been kidnapped in Iraq since the fall of Saddam in April 2003. More than 30 hostages have been killed by the captors.