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IRAQ - Suicide bombers yesterday killed nearly 130 people in two incidents in Iraq yesterday as the United States Senate backed a timetable for withdrawing American combat troops.
The Senate defied a veto threat by President George W. Bush and joined with the House of Representatives in backing a timetable for withdrawing troops. They want to start this year and to have all troops out by the end of March next year.
But there is no sign of improvement, with yesterday's attacks some of the worst in months.
Prime Minister Nouri Maliki, a Shiite, called for restraint and urged Iraqis to work with security forces to prevent the violence from spiralling out of control.
Bombs earlier this week in northern Iraq sparked mass reprisal killings.
One suicide bomber, possibly two, killed 62 people in a market in the Shaab district of northern Baghdad, police said, in what appeared to be the latest of a string of attacks on Shiite districts and towns.
"It is impossible to tell the exact number of dead because we are basically counting body parts," said a Health Ministry official in Baghdad.
Most of the victims were women and children who had been out shopping in the crowded market before the start of the nightly curfew, he said.
At about the same time, three suicide car bombs exploded within minutes of each other in Khalis, 80km north of Baghdad, killing 53 people and wounding 103. The first exploded in a commercial area and the second at a police checkpoint. A third bomber attacked police patrols rushing to the scene.
On Wednesday, two truck bombs killed 85 people in a Shiite area of Tal Afar in northern Iraq. In the hours after those blasts Shiite gunmen, including police, shot dead up to 70 Sunni Arab men in reprisal.
The top United States commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus, said police appeared to have carried out "retribution killings" after the bombings, which he blamed on al Qaeda.Reuters
- REUTERS
