Suicide bombers kill 29 in Iraq
Two suicide bombings killed 29 people in Iraq on Tuesday, including 25 who died when a bomber slammed his vehicle into a truck carrying gas cylinders at an Iraqi army checkpoint near Baiji.
The two attacks appeared to be directed against groups fighting al-Qaeda militants in Iraq.
The truck bombing occurred on the outskirts of the refinery town of Baiji, 200km north of Baghdad, an official from the joint Iraqi-US-security coordination centre in Tikrit said.
The bomber drove his pick-up vehicle into the truck, which was full of cooking gas cylinders, at the checkpoint manned by Iraqi soldiers and members of a group fighting al-Qaeda, the official said. About 85 people were also wounded.
A medic from the local hospital and the US military both confirmed the attack, which was close to the Baiji oil refinery from where fuel products are distributed across Iraq.
"We do have initial reports of a car bomb in Baiji today and that there were casualties," the military said without giving further details.
After the attack, the Baiji police chief Lieutenant Colonel Saleh al-Qaisi was sacked by the interior ministry, state-television Al-Iraqiya said, quoting the ministry's director of operations Brigadier General Abdel Karim Khalaf.
Shortly after the Baiji bombing, a suicide bomber blew himself up in the midst of a funeral procession in the city of Baquba, north of Baghdad, killing four people from a similar group fighting al-Qaeda, police and medics said.
An AFP correspondent on the scene reported that among those killed was Haj Farhan al-Baharzawi, the provincial head of the Brigades of 20th Revolution, a former Sunni insurgent group turned ally of the US military.
A doctor from Baquba hospital confirmed the casualties.
Baquba police Lieutenant Colonel Najim al-Sumaidaie said the funeral procession was marking the death of two members of the Brigades of 20th Revolution who were killed on Monday by the US military.
"The two were killed by mistake and the funeral was being held today when the suicide bomber attacked," Sumaidaie said.
The latest bombings highlighted al-Qaeda's fight back against the mushrooming number of groups across Iraq that oppose it.
Around 80,000 Sunni Arabs who were former rebels and fought the US military alongside al-Qaeda have now turned on the Islamist group in several volatile Sunni regions of Iraq.
al-Qaeda in Iraq has vowed to launch attacks against groups such as Al-Sahwa -- or the Awakening -- in a bid to draw them back into the anti-American insurgency.
The US military pays around 300 dollars to each member of these Awakening councils, which have been a key factor in reducing violence across Iraq in the past few months.
Insurgents have also stepped up attacks in northern Iraq after being pushed out of western and central regions following a series of military assaults.
US and Iraqi forces are currently involved in a massive military sweep in the northern provinces of Salaheddin -- which includes Baiji -- Nineveh and Kirkuk.
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