Civil war looms with 68 killed in Baghdad
(AP)
Updated: 2006-03-01 06:52

Another car bomb hit a small market opposite the Shiite Timimi mosque in the mostly Shiite Karradah neighborhood, killing six people and wounding 16.

Separately and in an unusual move, the government issued a statement declaring that 379 people had been killed and 458 wounded as of 4 p.m. Tuesday in the sectarian violence tied to the Askariya bombing.

The Washington Post reported Tuesday that more than 1,300 people were killed in the reprisal attacks. The Cabinet statement, however, said "what was reported in a foreign newspaper were inaccurate and exaggerated numbers of victims."

More than 60 relatives of the dead 锟斤拷 many of them women dressed in black and beating their breasts as they wailed in grief 锟斤拷 assembled with empty coffins at the morgue to take away their dead family members. One young man, who refused to give his name, told an AP reporter that his three brothers had gone out to buy bread Saturday night and were gunned down in a drive-by attack.

National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie, meanwhile, traveled to the Shiite holy city of Najaf on Tuesday to meet with Grand Ayatollah Ali Al-Sistani, the Shiite community's most revered spiritual leader. Al-Rubaie emerged to tell reporters "the way to forming the government is difficult and planted with political bombs. We ask the Iraqi people to be patient, and we expect forming the government will take a few months."

In the south Tuesday, two British soldiers were killed in Amarah, 180 miles from Baghdad, the Defense Ministry reported in London, but gave no other details. A witness said a car bomb targeted a British patrol and helicopters were seen taking away casualties.

The U.S. military reported a U.S. soldier was killed by small-arms fire west of Baghdad on Monday. No details were provided. The death brought to at least 2,292 the number of members of the U.S. military who have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an AP count. The figure includes seven military civilians.

In other violence Tuesday, a roadside bomb targeting the convoy of a defense ministry adviser killed five soldiers and injured seven others in the east Baghdad. The adviser, Lt. Gen. Daham Radhi al-Assal, escaped unharmed.