Naseer Al-Nahr, Asharq Al-Awsat

BAGHDAD, 23 November 2003 — Violence and bloodshed consumed Iraq yesterday when at least 18 Iraqis were killed and scores wounded in separate suicide bombings north of Baghdad and a civilian plane was targeted on its way out of the capital.

A day after two main Baghdad hotels and the Oil Ministry were attacked, suicide bombings struck the towns of Khan Bani Saad and Baqubah, killing at least 18, leaving more than 30 wounded.

A four-year-old girl was among three civilians and six police officers killed in the first attack in Khan Bani Saad, 20 kilometers (12 miles) from Baghdad, when a bomber rammed a vehicle packed with explosives into a police station.

Minutes later another suicide assailant blew himself up outside the police station in the provincial capital of Baqubah further north, killing seven Iraqi policemen and two civilians, said Col. Bill MacDonald, spokesman for the US 4th Infantry Division, which patrols the region.

A further five Iraqi police were still missing from that attack, MacDonald said.

The horror of the human detritus from the two attacks was so great that doctors said it was difficult to be precise about the toll.

Flesh and body parts were strewn over the ground at both sites. Police were forced to fire in the air to disperse anguished residents so they could evacuate the wounded and clear the area.

“We received so many body parts it’s difficult to know how many died,” said doctor Taleb Hussein Al-Tamimi. “We’ve been utterly overwhelmed.”

“The people responsible for this Iraqi-on-Iraqi violence have no regard for innocent lives,” the 4th ID’s commander, Maj. Gen. Ray Odierno said.

“The friends and families of the policemen killed alongside the tens of thousands of other police officers who have taken an oath of office to take security and stability to Iraq, can take solace in the fact that, because of their sacrifice, Iraq will know peaceful freedom and enduring democracy.”

The US-led occupation administration said it was “determined to find those responsible.”

“It is very clear that the terrorists have targeted the very Iraqis that are trying to improve the security and life for ordinary Iraqis,” its spokesman Charles Heatly said.

The northeastern province of Diyala, where the two towns are located, has long been a hotbed of anti-coalition attacks but the twin attacks were the most devastating in the area to date.

And in the capital itself, a DHL cargo plane taking off from Baghdad airport was hit by a SAM-7 surface-to-air missile, a military official said. “It caught fire, it turned around and came back to the airport where it safely landed. The fire was put out. There are no injuries,” he added.

Basim Al-Waziri, a resident of the southern Yusifiyeh area of the capital said he saw the missile being fired on the aircraft and hitting its left wing, setting it ablaze.

DHL, the first to be given authorization by the US-led coalition to operate out of Baghdad, confirmed that its staff had suffered no injuries. DHL spokeswoman Patricia Thomson said the Airbus A300 freighter had been flying from Baghdad to the company’s Gulf hub in Bahrain when it was forced to return to the Iraqi capital at around 9:30 a.m. (0630 GMT).

“This emergency landing was undertaken successfully. I’m delighted to confirm that all on board escaped any injury.”

It was the first time that a plane using Baghdad airport had been hit by a missile although eight previous firings had been reported. All of those were against military or official aircraft, not civilian planes, according to the Iraqi Transport Ministry.

The strike prompted DHL to announce it had halted its flights for “at least the next 48 hours” while Royal Jordanian, parent company of Royal Wings, said it was cancelling flights from Amman to Baghdad until at least Wednesday.

The New York-based Human Rights Watch said yesterday that Iraqi resistance is increasingly targeting Iraqi civilians perceived to be cooperating with the US-installed government.

“Increasingly, armed opponents of the US-led occupation of Iraq are targeting Iraqi civilians whom they perceive as cooperating with the CPA,” the US-led Coalition Provisional Authority, which is illegal under international humanitarian law, it said in a statement.

The latest violence followed defiant statements by US President George W. Bush and British Prime Minister Tony Blair that coalition troops would stay in Iraq until security is restored and would not be deterred by attacks or terrorists.

A senior army officer told the New York Times that US Army planners foresee maintaining 100,000 US troops in Iraq through early 2006. The plans reflect concern that stabilizing Iraq could be more difficult than originally planned, the daily said.

If force levels are maintained at such levels beyond 2006 the military will “really start to feel the pain” of long deployment, the officer said on condition of anonymity.

US-led coalition troops in Iraq have come under increasing attack, prompting an all-out offensive by the US military in Baghdad — dubbed Operation Iron Hammer — against the resistance.

— Additional input from agencies