A suicide bomber exploded a car in the middle of a funeral gathering in an Iraqi town north of Baghdad today, killing 13 people and wounding at least 35.
The blast in Khalis, some 50 miles from Baghdad, was the bloodiest attack in Iraq since an interim government took charge from US-led occupiers on June 28th.
A senior police commander was among those wounded in the attack on the funeral for the brother of the town's mayor, police said. Tents had been erected in the street to shelter mourners paying condolences to the man's family.
The bombing shattered a relative lull in attacks since Washington's handover to the interim government and occurred a day after US warplanes bombed a suspected militant target in Falluja, killing 13 people and wounding seven.
Prime Minister Iyad Allawi's government said it would unveil a new security law tomorrow for wider powers to combat insurgents, an announcement that has been delayed several times.
Foreign Minister Hoshiyar Zebari said yesterday the law would empower the government to impose curfews, set up checkpoints and search and detain suspects. The measures would be temporary and would apply only in parts of Iraq. Mr Allawi, like Washington, blames Saddam Hussein supporters and foreign Islamic militants for attacks that have wreaked havoc since last year's US-led invasion and has vowed to crush them.
Mr Allawi said Iraqi intelligence work had led to the US air strike on a house in Falluja, west of Baghdad, that he said was used by a group led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, accused by Washington of links to al-Qaeda. Hospital sources said women and children were among the casualties in the raid, the fifth such strike on Falluja in three weeks and the first since the June 28th handover.
Kidnappers in Iraq released a Lebanese-born US marine whom they were earlier believed to have decapitated, the hostage's brother said. The US military in Baghdad could not immediately confirm that Wassef Ali Hassoun, missing since June 21st, had been released.
Conflicting statements on Internet sites have sown confusion about Hassoun's fate in the last few days. One Islamist group denied a claim put out in its name that he had been beheaded. The Islamic Response Movement said last night he had been moved to "safety" after pledging to leave the military.
US patrols came under fire in Falluja and Ramadi, another Sunni Muslim city west of Baghdad, witnesses said. The US military had no word on those attacks, but it said three marines were killed in action in western Iraq yesterday. The deaths brought the number of US soldiers killed in combat to more than 640 since the start of last year's war to oust Saddam.