TA-ATTACKS: Car Bombings at Four Basra Police Stations, Numerous Casualties, Al Qaeda Blamed

Near-simultaneous car bombings devastated three police stations in Basra, Iraq during the height of morning rush hour on Wednesday. As many as 68 people have died, including 16 children who were on a buses to kindergarten and middle school. At least 230 are injured, some seriously. British troops are among the injured, but no word if any Coalition forces died in the attack.
A fourth bomb rocked the police academy in the Basra suburb of Zubair a short time afterwards, killing three. An hour later, a fifth blast hit the same academy.

Associated Press

Reports indicate at least three car bombs went off, with some witnesses reporting as many as five. An Iraqi police colonel says the explosions may have been caused by rockets. At the Saudia station, which was the most-damaged of the four locations, a crater six feet deep and nine feet across was left in the ground, indicating the car bomb theory is more likely. There is no official word on the cause at this time.

British troops rushing to the scene were unable to assist "because coalition forces are being stoned by crowds".

The police station at Saudia was heavily damaged in the explosion, its facade showing a crater two metres deep and three metres wide.

An injured witness, Amin Dinar, speaking from his hospital bed said "I looked around and saw my leg bleeding and my neighbor lying dead on the floor, torn apart. I saw a minibus full of children on fire -- 15 of the 18 passengers were killed and three badly wounded."

Basra Mayor Wael Abdul-Hafeez has named Al Qaeda operatives as prime suspects behind the attacks.

Related Stories:
Reuters
CNN.com
BBC.co.uk
Guardian.co.uk


[Edited on 22-4-2004 by Banshee]

[Edited on 4-22-2004 by Valhall]

The Aljazeera take is interesting:

english.aljazeera.net...


[Edited on 21-4-2004 by Cascadego]

At least 55 killed, over 200 injured in multiple explosions



BASRA, Iraq - A series of explosions ripped through three police stations and a police academy in the southern Iraqi city of Basra Wednesday, killing at least 55 people, including some 10 schoolchildren, and injuring at least 238, officials said.

Three near simultaneous blasts targeted police stations at rush hour in Basra. At about the same time, a fourth explosion ripped through the police academy in the Basra suburb of Zubair . An hour later another blast targeted the same police academy.

Blasts hit police stations in Basra

So...why are they killing Iraqi children and civilians?

Are the same types of pictures going to be released as were when our troops started the fight against the insurgency in Fallujah and "SOMEBODY" killed civilians during the fighting?

Are we going to see the bodies of these little children blown up on their kindergarten bus all laid out on blankets and every one standing around shaking their heads at the evil these people have perpetrated?

hmmm...I don't think we will. Instead, we're seeing blown up cars and Iraqi's throwing rocks at British tanks - see here?



hmmm...Arab news seems to be treating this atrocity a bit different than the deaths during the fighting, huh?

600 civilians have been killed since 5th of april by US troops, and it doesnt get a mention but this does?

They targeted police stations which is fair enough, the police are conspiring with the illegal occupiers. But it is a pity that passers by were injured, especially that busload of kids....but hey if the US does it it's only 'colateral damage'.

Well, first off, sirino, it HAS been mentioned...repeatedly. But concerning your other views, how CAN'T you see the difference between causing civilian deaths unintentionally during a military action, and causing civilian deaths because that's exactly what you meant to do?

I was struck straight away by the planned similtaneous nature of this attack.

Although tension across Iraq is high there is not the same animosity in the south of Iraq as there is towards the US forces in the north.

Much has been made of the different tactics by the two main coalition forces and I'm sure that plays a part but the north was always going to be the harder part of Iraq to occupy.

Considering all this and the bombing almost similtaneuously in Saudi Arabia,I would suggest this was Al Qaeda and not the same kind of Iraqi malcontents that the US have been facing in Falluja.

There are signs of co-ordination and I'm not convinced that there won't be more attacks today.

Just to answer the point Valhall makes.As a father myself I can tell you it wouldn't make any difference to me if my daughter were harmed by a missile fired by a helicopter by an occupying force or by a car bomb.

I hope that answers your question.There is no difference.

Firing missiles into a built up area is just as remote ,and therefore,irresponsible as planting a car bomb.If women and children have not been verified not to be ion a building before firing then the chances ,as a percentage, of them being casualties is exactly the same as a car bomb.

Later the US forces would lay siege and invite women and children to leave the town of Falluja.Until they did that they were attacking the full social composition of the local population.

I'm sure the guy in the helicopter may have hoped that no children were killed but as a soldier he had greater responsibilities than just wishful thinking.Equally I'm sure the car bomber hoped that children would not be killed he was just less disillusioned as to the consequences of his action.

No difference to a mother, father, brother, or sister.

[Edited on 21-4-2004 by John bull 1]

I am with JB here. I believe we will see more large scale attacks happens today. I hope I'm wrong though.

20 schoolchildren among the 68 dead.
*sighs*

Wait a minute.

You mean to tell me that there was a bombing in Iraq that the US military was NOT in some way blamed for?

This must be a first.

Iraqis pulled charred and torn bodies from mangled vehicles in front of the Saudi police station, located by Basra's crowded main street market. Two vans carrying schoolchildren were destroyed, one carrying kindergarteners, the other carrying middle-school girls. Dead children, burned beyond recognition, were taken to hospital morgues

Justify it, defend its reasoning...go ahead.

16 children incinerated in their school buses.

An Associated Press reporter counted the bodies of 10 kindergartners and six older girls at Basra's Teaching Hospital, where the morgue was full and corpses were left in the halls.

They killed their own children or someone else did. So how many virgins will Allah award them for that?

Either we get out of Dodge or we turn it up a notch or two.

This is a sick, twisted game these people are playing. Using children like pawns on a chessboard. Sickening.