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51 killed in twin car bombings in Iraq

(Agencies)
Updated: 2009-04-30 19:27

BAGHDAD – The death toll from twin car bomb blasts in a crowded Baghdad market rose to 51 Thursday, police said, and the country's main Sunni political party condemned the attack on a heavily Shi'ite Muslim area.

Iraqis protest (background) as Iraqi army officers hold them back following several car bombs in the market in Baghdad's eastern Sadr City district.  [Agencies]

The car bombs Wednesday, which also wounded 76 people in the capital's sprawling Sadr City slum, followed a series of other attacks in the past two weeks that have stirred fears of a return to broader sectarian bloodshed in Iraq.

A third car bomb was found in a parked taxi cab and detonated by security forces.

Related readings:  Blasts kill 78 in Iraq's bloodiest day in a year  Suicide bomber kills 9 Sunni militiamen in Iraq

The Iraqi Islamic Party, the main political party in parliament representing the country's once dominant Sunni minority, denounced the attack as a blatant attempt to trigger renewed fighting between Sunnis and Shi'ites.

"The bloody hands want Iraqis to feel fear," the party said in a statement.

"These explosions in Sadr City are part of a big conspiracy by Iraq's enemies. We call on all political groups and the Iraqi government, and especially the security forces, to quell this sedition."

The upsurge in violence this month has ended the sense of growing calm and security that had gripped Baghdad earlier this year.

While the violence remains below the levels of last year, the attacks coincide with plans for US combat troops to pull out of Iraqi cities in June, ahead of a full withdrawal from Iraq by the end of 2011.

Iraqis still lack faith in the abilities of their own security forces to defend them against bombs and other attacks.

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