Blast 'kills 28' during Iraq raid [View All]

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At least 28 people have been killed in an explosion as Iraqi police raided a house in Baghdad, police say. It is understood the police had gone to the house after receiving a tip-off that a militant was hiding there.

The incident comes a day after insurgents attacked Iraqi police posts in Sunni Muslim strongholds. In one of the apparently co-ordinated strikes, a police station south of Tikrit, was stormed by gunmen who executed 12 officers.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/4131479.stm

A powerful blast destroyed a house in western Baghdad during an overnight raid by police, flattening several nearby buildings and killing at least 28 people including seven policemen, police said on Wednesday. They said the house had been raided because it was a suspected base for foreign militants. As police burst in, a blast tore through the building. Five nearby houses were also destroyed. By dawn, U.S. and Iraqi troops had sealed off the site.

Some locals said they believed the house had been used by foreign Arab fighters. The U.S. military says the main groups behind the insurgency in Iraq (news - web sites) are Sunni Muslim militants, former supporters of Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), and foreign fighters.
Washington has offered $25 million for information leading to the death or capture of Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, who has been hailed as the head of Al Qaeda in Iraq in an audiotape purportedly from Osama bin Laden (news - web sites) aired this week.

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&cid=578&e=2&u=/nm/20041229/ts_nm/iraq_blast_dc