BAGHDAD,
January 31 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - In a new bloody day
for U.S.-occupied Iraq, nine people and three American soldiers were
killed Saturday, January 31, in two separate attacks.
Nine
Iraqis, including two policemen, breathed their last and 45 were
injured when a car bomb exploded in front of a police station in the
northern Iraqi city of Mosul, reported Agence France-Presse (AFP)
quoting hospital officials.
"Nine
people were killed, including two policemen and seven civilians, and
45 wounded," said the head of the emergency unit at the Mosul
hospital, Najem Abdullah Shuaib.
Police
confirmed the toll while another doctor, Haitham Abdallah, said four
of the wounded were in critical condition.
Several
policemen are among the injured, including two lieutenant colonels,
one major and one lieutenant, he added.
The
blast occurred at around 10:30 am (0730 GMT) in the Al-Thaqfa area of
Mosul, 370 kilometers (230 miles) north of Baghdad.
Witness
Mohammad Abdel Karim, 39, who works in the shop opposite the police
station told AFP that "an Opel sped up, got past the checkpoint
and the driver blew up his car. There was an enormous explosion".
A
chunk of the front of the police station was engulfed in flames and
two rooms on the ground floor totally destroyed.
Five
vehicles, including the bomber's car, were gutted in the blast.
Iraqi
police and other local security forces have increasingly become the
target of attacks by resistance fighters who regard them as
collaborating with the occupation.
More
than 300 Iraqi police have been killed in bomb blasts and other
assaults since the end of the war to oust Saddam Hussein, according to
Iraq's interior ministry.
U.S.
Soldiers Killed
In
another development, three American soldiers were killed Saturday in
an attack on their military convoy while traveling between the Iraqi
towns of Tikrit and Kirkuk.
The
convoy was attacked by a homemade bomb 45 kilometers (27 miles)
southwest of the oil center of Kirkuk, a U.S. military spokesman said.
Police
said US forces were defusing an improvised explosive device (IED) 300
meters (yards) from the main U.S. base at Kirkuk airport when the
blast happened.
Police
Colonel Khattab Abdullah Arif said the incident happened on the road
to Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's home town.
The
deaths pushed to 249 the number of American combat fatalities in Iraq
since U.S. President George W. Bush declared an end to major
hostilities on May 1, according to an AFP count.
