Iraq

Iraqis mourn dozens killed in suicide attack

Article published on the 2009-06-21 Latest update 2009-06-21 15:42 TU

The site of a suicide bombing in Taza, Iraq, 20 June 2009
(Photo: Reuters)

US soldiers and emergency workers on Sunday helped residents look through the rubble for loved ones killed in the suicide bombing in Taza, Iraq on Sunday. Officials say that 72 people died and 200 wounded, and also that insurgents had killed nine police in the last two days in Baghdad and Mosul.

The truck bombing also destroyed dozens of houses and left a deep crater.

Doctors say they expect the death toll to increase.

The International Committee of the Red Cross sent a tonne of medical equipment to Kirkuk hospital nearby.

"Most of the victims were children, the elderly or women," provincial governor Abdel Rahman Mustafa told AFP news agency.

Taza is a mainly Turkmen town. The Turkmen Front, Iraq's main Turkmen political party, announced three days of mourning and called for an "immediate investigation... and for the criminals to be brought to justice."

UN Special Representative Staffan de Mistura described it as a horrifying and wicked crime against innocent civilians" that was "aimed at provoking a new cycle of mass violence and revenge".

Also, Britain's Foreign Office said on Sunday that two bodies handed over in Iraq were "highly likely" to be those of two bodyguards who were among five men taken hostage in Baghdad in May 2007.

"It is with deep regret that we have today informed the families of the hostages that, based on very strong indications, the two bodies recovered are highly likely to be those of Jason Creswell, originally from Glasgow, and Jason Swindlehurst, originally from Skelmersdale," the Foreign Office said.

Creswell and Swindlehurst, whose full names have never previously been revealed, were among four bodyguards escorting computer consultant Peter Moore when they were seized in the Iraqi capital.