BAGHDAD ? At least 10 insurgents attacked the western Iraq city of Ramadi on Sunday, setting off six explosions, storming a police station and engaging in a firefight that left at least 21 dead, including eight policemen, government and police officials said.
The gun battle ? inside a building near a police compound ? left seven insurgents dead. Police were still trying to capture two men wearing explosive suicide vests, Hakmet Jassim, the deputy governor of largely-Sunni Anbar Province, said at about 3:30 p.m. Iraq time. A leading sheik in the area, Hammed al-Hies, blamed the attack on corruption in Iraq?s police and judicial agencies as well as the country?s broader political troubles. An immediate curfew was enacted in the city.
Suicide bomb attacks have killed thousands in Iraq since 2006. Use the interactive to view the human toll up to today.
The attack followed a huge blast Saturday outside the southern city of Basra, which killed at least 53 Shiite pilgrims on a march to a religious shrine. The country is increasingly on edge after previous bombings in the wake of the U.S. troop withdrawal last month. Officials fear that insurgents are trying to provoke a sectarian war between Sunni and Shiite extremists.
In Ramadi Sunday, the explosions began at 11:55 a.m., said Maj. Mahmoud Khaleel, of the Anbar provincial police. An explosive-laded car erupted outside an Investment Commission building. Another car bomb blew up outside Ramadi?s main water tank, Khaleel said. More charges erupted, including one outside a Sunni endowment building, Khaleel said.
The final explosion came from a suicide-bomber, wearing a blasting vest. He detonated himself outside a gate at Ramadi?s main police compound, which houses a jail, investigation bureau and a counter- terrorism operation, Khaleel said.
The man apparently was trying to open the building for other insurgents. But police repelled the advance, Khaleel said, and chased the insurgents into a nearby empty building.
?We killed seven of the nine insurgents,? Jassim said.
Six civilians were killed in the attacks, and 21 civilians and policemen were injured, Khaleel said.
?All these attacks happened because of the political problems in the country, and the corruption that spread inside the body of the security agencies and the judicial systems,? said Hies, chairman of the Salvation Council of Anbar.
In the city of Haditha, also in the Anbar province, officials imposed a curfew and closed roads Sunday, while police looked insurgents reported to be inside two bomb-laden cars.
Source: http://feeds.washingtonpost.com/click.phdo?i=a838a4586de883a6578eeac8964ee326
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