At least 85 people were killed and more than 180 injured by a car bomb and coordinated truck bomb in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk July 16. One car bomb exploded in a crowded market near an office of the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan (PUK) and the second went off in a commercial area. Later, a third bomber driving a Volkswagen Passat attacked a police patrol in southern Kirkuk, killing one police officer and seriously wounding 10 others. Many victims were women and children shopping in the busy street market. The attacks come amid rising ethnic tensions in Kirkuk, which is 60 miles west of Sulaymaniyah, the largest city in the PUK-controlled region of Kurdistan. Kurds have aggressively moved into Kirkuk since the 2003 invasion, angering Turkmen and Arab residents who fear PUK designs to annext the oil-rich city. (Al-Bawaba [2], Jordan; NYT [3], July 16)
See our last posts on Iraq [4], Kurdistan [5] and the struggle for Kirkuk [6].
