A car bomb exploded Thursday along a bustling commercial street in a mostly Shiite area of north Baghdad, killing at least 20 people and wounding dozens in the third major attack in the capital this month.
Shaken survivors voiced fears that the blast heralded a return to violence that swept Baghdad before U.S. and Iraqi forces turned the tide in late 2007.
Witnesses said the vehicle was parked along a street near a bus stop, a food market and a hospital in the Shaab district when it blew up around noon. Shaab had been a mixed area of Sunnis and Shiites until many Sunnis were driven out in the wave of ethnic slaughter two years ago.
Reports of the casualty toll varied: The Iraqi Army's Baghdad command said 20 people were killed and 73 wounded; an Interior Ministry official said 22 were killed and 48 wounded, and local police and hospital officials said 26 were killed and 37 wounded.
A U.S. soldier died Wednesday of noncombat injuries in Iraq , the military said. It was the eighth U.S. military death in March in Iraq, half of which were listed as noncombat deaths.
Nine Afghan policemen were killed by Taliban insurgents Thursday at a checkpoint in Helmand Province, and six policemen and two civilians were wounded in a Taliban ambush in Ghazni Province, Interior Ministry officials said in Kabul.
NEWS SERVICES
