Shell kills 7 in crowded Baghdad street

BAGHDAD - Insurgents fired a shell into a crowded street in the Iraqi capital yesterday, killing seven people, including two children, and wounding 42, hospital officials say.

Interior Ministry officials had earlier said the blast was caused by a car bomb. At least five cars were destroyed in the explosion in Rasheed street, a busy commercial part of the city centre.

"The place was very crowded, it is a commercial area ... Casualties are being taken to hospital now," an Interior Ministry official said.

The blast came as an Iraqi national conference, held in central Baghdad's fortified Green Zone, was due to elect a 100-member assembly to oversee elections in January.

Insurgents fired several mortar bombs near the Green Zone on Sunday as the conference opened. Two people were killed in that attack.

Meanwhile, Iraq's interim President pledged yesterday the new Government would crack down on separatist Kurdish rebels waging attacks on Turkey from mountain bases in northern Iraq.

Kurdish rebels fighting for autonomy have stepped up attacks in Turkey, officials said, including bombings last week at two small hotels and at a liquefied petroleum gas plant in Istanbul that killed two people and wounded 11 others.

Turkey has repeatedly urged US and Iraqi authorities to crack down on the rebels, and President Ghazi al-Yawer assured Turkey's President Ahmet Necdet Sezer that action would be taken. "We cannot tolerate or allow any group or formation that is posing a threat to the security of our neighbours."

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq