June 09, 2008	Monday	Jamadi-us-Sani 04, 1429

BAGHDAD, June 8: A wave of bomb and mortar attacks, including a strike on Baghdad’s heavily fortified government and embassy compound, killed at least 12 people in Iraq on Sunday, officials said.

At least four civilians were killed and 23 wounded in the deadliest attack at a police centre in the Al-Yarmuk district of west Baghdad, interior ministry and hospital officials said.

The victims were waiting to enlist in the force when the bomber struck.

Iraq’s security forces and police recruits have been a frequent target for insurgent attack in the violence-ravaged country.

On Saturday, a suicide bomber ploughed his vehicle into a police car in the same district, killing a policeman and a civilian and wounding six other people.

Another three people were killed and seven wounded on Sunday in a mortar attack on the Green Zone, which houses the US embassy as well as Iraqi government offices.

An interior ministry official said the mortar fire apparently targeted the defence ministry but added that the round fell short striking one of the entrances to the compound. Just over a week ago, a Filipino was killed and two female compatriots wounded in another mortar attack on the Green Zone.

Northeast of the capital, unidentified gunmen stormed a market in Qazaniya, killing five people in the town near the border with Iran, police said.

The US military meanwhile announced that a US soldier was killed on Saturday when his vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb as it travelled through the east of the capital.

West of the capital, Iraqi police dismantled an Al-Qaeda cell of would-be suicide bombers in the town of Hit on Sunday and seized 50 explosive belts primed for use, mayor Sheikh Hikmat Jubair al-Kaud said.

Hit lies in Al-Anbar province, which was a bastion of the Sunni Arab insurgency that erupted shortly after the US-led invasion but has seen a sharp fall in violence since the US military began recruiting local tribal chiefs to fight Al-Qaeda 18 months ago.

According to the mayor, the dismantled cell carried out a June 1 attack on a police checkpoint in Hit that killed nine people, including an officer.

The US army said it made 49 arrests after that attack.

The head of the US Central Intelligence Agency Michael Hayden said in late May that Al Qaeda was essentially defeated in Iraq.

Hayden told the Washington Post he was encouraged by US successes against Al Qaeda’s affiliates and by what he described as the rising competence of the Iraqi military and a growing popular antipathy towards the jihadists.—AFP