BAGHDAD, April 11, (Agencies): Bombings in two central Iraqi cities killed at least 17 people on Monday, with twin blasts near a school and market in a former insurgent stronghold leaving six dead, officials said.
In the city of Fallujah, police chief Brig Gen Mahmoud al-Issawi said a parked car packed with explosives blew up at about 11:00 am as police were trying to defuse it. The blast killed two policemen. About 15 minutes later, the second car bomb exploded about 150 yards (meters) away, targeting people who had gathered near the scene of the first blast, Al-Issawi said. That blast killed four civilians and injured 20, including two policemen. The target was unclear, but both cars exploded near a school and market in Fallujah, 40 miles (65 kms) west of Baghdad in the Sunni-dominated Anbar province. The western city was once a capital for Iraq’s insurgency.

Earlier Monday, four civilians were killed and 11 others were wounded when a minibus hit a roadside bomb in southeastern Baghdad, officials said. Among the dead was a 10-year girl. The casualties were confirmed by two police officers and a hospital doctor, all of whom spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to speak to the media. Even though insurgents have been weakened across Iraq in the last few years, deadly bombings and shootings still happen almost every day. At a press conference in Baghdad, the head of the European Union’s legal training program said he understood the Iraqi frustration with the slow strides security forces are making toward protecting the country. Francisco Diaz Alcantud urged patience, noting that more time and resources will be needed to fix what he described as challenges to getting Iraq’s police, judges and prison officials up to speed.

“Some progress has been made, but of course still what remains in front of us are a lot of challenges,” Diaz Alcantud told reporters. “There is room to still do more. We cannot train the whole staff of the Iraqi police.” Since 2005, the EU’s Rule of Law Mission for Iraq has trained about 4,000 Iraqi mid-to-senior level legal officials — including 267 women — on an annual budget of 22 million euros ($31.8 million). That’s a fraction of the $1 billion the US Embassy in Baghdad is seeking from Congress to help train some of the estimated 400,000 Iraqi police forces.

Meanwhile, Iraqi authorities are interrogating six members of an Iranian exile group who were arrested during deadly clashes with the Iraqi army, police said Monday. “Six members of the People’s Mujahedeen of Iran (PMOI) were arrested and are being questioned at the Khalis prison,” the police official said. The jail is about 20 kms (12.5 miles) south of Camp Ashraf, where members of the Iranian exile group clashed with Iraqi security forces on Friday. The PMOI said that 33 people were killed and 300 wounded in the incident, but Iraqi security and hospital sources said three were killed.

The rebels say that Iraqi security forces were surrounding the camp, refusing access to journalists or humanitarian aid for the wounded. The US military acknowledged it was initially denied access for medical assistance, but said late Sunday a medical team had finally been allowed in to “provide any essential humanitarian medical assistance that may be required”. “The results of this medical assistance and our assessment of medical conditions is being provided to the Iraqi government, which will authorize any further assistance that may be required,” the military said in a statement.

“As our entrance into the camp was purely for humanitarian purposes on behalf of the Iraqi government, we will only provide the results of that visit to Iraqi officials,” it added. After the clashes, the United States said it was urging Iraqi officials “at the highest levels” to avoid violence and show restraint. The PMOI used Camp Ashraf, which houses some 3,500 people, as a base for launching attacks on Iran during the rule of Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein but US forces disarmed the group after the 2003 invasion of Iraq.

Since then the camp’s residents have been protected under the Geneva Conventions and were guarded by US troops, although Washington still officially considers the PMOI to be a terrorist organisation. A left-wing Islamic movement, the PMOI was founded in 1965 in opposition to the Shah of Iran and has subsequently fought to oust the clerical regime that took power in Tehran after Iran’s 1979 Islamic revolution. Iran, which has jailed or executed many members of the outlawed organisation, hailed Iraq’s actions on Saturday.