Scores killed, injured in Basra explosion, seven Americans killed
Some 20 Iraqis were killed and other 45 injured in a booby trapped car explosion in Basra city in south Iraq on Monday evening.
A source in the Iraqi ministry of interior said that a booby trapped car went off in a crowded market in Algeria Street when a policy vehicle was running in Basra.
Basra witnessed tension between rivalry Shiite militias and the killing of 16 in a bomb explosion in September, however, the city remained beyond the operations of gunmen in the central and northern areas of Iraq.
The Basra attack came with the announcement on the killing of seven American soldiers in Iraq during the past 24 hours. A statement by the American army explained that seven of its soldiers were killed in al-Yousefeyah area, west of Baghdad, while two other soldiers were killed near Balad, 70 km north of the Baghdad. The 7th was killed in west Baghdad.
With the announcement on the killing of the seven American soldiers, the number of the killed Americans increased to its highest level since almost 9 months as this number reached in October 93 American soldiers.
The US defense office explained the increase in the number of its killed soldiers to that the Iraqi armed groups are using more sophisticated explosives that are able to inflect losses in the lines of the American forces. The spokesman for the US defense department described the situation as saying "we are before an enemy who continues to deploy certain innovation on more precise and destructive weapons."
In other field developments, two Iraqi soldiers were killed and other four injured in a roadside bomb explosion north of Falluja. The Karbala police, south of Baghdad, announced the killing of two gunmen and the detention of a third in clashes north of the city.
Two other Iraqi soldiers were killed and other four injured when several mortar shelling fell on their headquarters south Baqouba, northeast of Baghdad. One attack by a booby trapped car targeted a procession for the army north west of Baghdad and this resulted in injuring seven persons. In al-Daloyea north of Baghdad, one translator working with the American forces was killed. One person was also killed and other seven injured in a suicide bombing explosion in one Iraqi military point in Sanjar west of Iraq.
In al-Qaem city near the Iraqi- Syrian borders, an American air raid killed some 40 Iraqis including 12 children and injured scores, according to Iraqi medical sources. At a time when the marines forces considered that the target of the bombardment was a shelter for leading figures of al-Qaida in al-Karbala area, Iraqi sources said that victims of the bombardment were only evacuees from the adjoining Huseiba town.
