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Female suicide bomber targets football fans in Iraq

A female suicide bomber targeted a crowd of football fans celebrating Iraq's win in a World Cup qualifier, wounding at least 34 people near a cafe north of Baghdad, police said.

  • AP
  • Published: 09:31 June 15, 2008
  • Gulf News

Baghdad: A female suicide bomber targeted a crowd of football fans celebrating Iraq's win in a World Cup qualifier, wounding at least 34 people near a cafe north of Baghdad, police said.

The young woman, who was covered in a traditional black Islamic robe, was dropped off by a car shortly before the attack on Saturday as dozens of cheering young men poured out onto the streets after watching Iraq beat China 2-1 on television in the cafe in the town of Qara Tappah.

The woman told suspicious police that she was waiting for her husband but blew herself up after an officer spotted the detonator and began screaming at the crowd to disperse, according to the town's top administrator, Serwan Shukir.

Seven police and 27 civilians were among the wounded, Shukir said, but the officer's warning had averted a higher casualty toll by preventing the woman from reaching the bulk of the fans.

In Baghdad, a bomb hidden on a bus exploded in a Shiite neighbourhood, killing two people and wounding eight, police said. Three other civilians were injured Saturday when a roadside bomb exploded near a police patrol in the capital's Karradah district, police said.

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