Irbil, Iraq – A suicide attacker slipped into line at a police recruitment center in this usually tranquil northern Kurdish city and blew himself up Wednesday, leaving the streets slick with blood in the deadliest insurgent attack in more than two months, police said. Sixty Iraqis were killed and 150 wounded.
A Sunni militant group, Ansar al-Sunnah Army, claimed responsibility, saying the attack was revenge for Kurdish cooperation with U.S. forces.
Militants frequently target security forces and recruits, leaving Iraq’s government grappling with how to stabilize the country.
Early today, two attacks targeting police patrols killed a total of nine policemen in neighborhoods of western Baghdad, an official said.
In a third incident today, a man carrying hidden explosives set them off inside an Iraqi army recruitment center in central Baghdad, killing at least 11, police said.
In Irbil, 215 miles north of Baghdad, some 250 job seekers were waiting to be searched outside the recruitment center when the bomb went off, police Capt. Othman Aziz said.
An Iraqi insurgent joined the line and detonated explosives concealed on his body, he said.
Meanwhile, in San Diego on Wednesday, the Marine Corps said a corporal who was videotaped shooting an apparently injured and unarmed Iraqi in a Fallujah mosque last year will not face a court-martial.
A review of the evidence showed the Marine’s actions were “consistent with the established rules of engagement and the law of armed conflict,” said Maj. Gen. Richard Natonski, commanding general of the 1st Marine Division.
The corporal was not identified.
In sworn statements, the corporal said he shot three insurgents in self-defense in the mosque Nov. 13, believing they posed a threat to him and his fellow Marines, the statement said. Autopsies showed that all three died of multiple wounds from gunshots fired from the corporal’s M-16.
One of the shootings was recorded by Kevin Sites, an NBC cameraman embedded with the Marines, and the dramatic footage prompted outrage among Iraqis and an immediate investigation by the Marine Corps.
Also Wednesday, the Washington Post reported that the U.S. military is examining reports that insurgent leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi was at a hospital in Anbar province last week, raising the possibility that he may be ill or wounded.
U.S. officials gave no details as to why they believe al-Zarqawi may be sick or injured, but U.S. military authorities were quoted this month as saying that al-Zarqawi had left medical information about himself on a laptop computer that was seized Feb. 20 in his closest known call with American pursuers.
When his car was pulled over at a checkpoint outside Ramadi, al-Zarqawi fled on foot, leaving behind the laptop, photos of himself and contacts, officials said.
The Washington Post contributed to this report.
