January 07, 2008	Monday	Zilhaj 27, 1428

BAGHDAD, Jan 6: A suicide bomber blew himself up among soldiers and civilians celebrating Iraq’s national Army Day holiday in central Baghdad on Sunday, killing 11 people.

The bomber struck as an elderly man was placing flowers into the barrels of three Iraqi soldiers’ rifles.

He and the soldiers were among the casualties. Minutes before the blast soldiers had been dancing and chanting “Where is terrorism today?”

The attack was the worst in a series of bombings in the capital. Police said three people were killed in the northern district of Qahira when a car bomb blew up outside a restaurant.

One person was killed in three blasts in central Nahda.

Three bombs exploded outside two Christian churches and a nuns’ convent in the city of Mosul in the northern province of Nineveh, where US commanders say Al Qaeda is regrouping. Police said four people were wounded in the blasts.

While overall levels of violence in Iraq are down, US military figures show that suicide bomb attacks have increased slightly since reaching a low in October.

Witnesses said the bomber, wearing an explosives vest, tried to gain access to the offices of the Iraqi Unity Gathering, a non-governmental group hosting an Army Day event for army officers, most of whom attended in civilian clothes.

Tribal leaders from both of Iraq’s religious sects and clerics also attended the ceremony, marking the 87th anniversary of the formation of the first Iraqi army regiment, held in a house in a residential neighbourhood in Karrada district. Reuters television footage showed a group of soldiers dancing in a circle in the street, waving their AK-47 assault rifles in the air and chanting just minutes before the bomber struck.

An Interior Ministry official said four policemen, three soldiers and four civilians were killed and 17 wounded. A second police source put the death toll at eight.

The bomber attacked as people were leaving the NGO’s offices and milling about outside. Security force members who had been standing guard appeared to have taken the brunt of the blast.—Reuters