Female suicide bomber targets anti-al Qaeda group, kills 16
BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) — At least 16 people were killed and 31 others wounded when a female suicide bomber detonated in Muqdadiya, north of Baghdad, an official with Iraq’s Interior Ministry said.
The suicide bomber was female and a former member of Saddam Hussein’s Baath Party, Gen. Mohammed Al-Tamimi of the local police said. He identified her as a local woman named Suhaila Ali.
The blast took place outside a building that hosts meetings for local members of a so-called awakening council, whose members are opposed to al Qaeda and have formed an alliance with U.S. and Iraqi forces.
Awakening councils include former militants — often armed — who create neighborhood watch groups to root out insurgent elements in an area.
More than half of the dead and wounded in Friday’s bombing were members of the awakening council, the Interior Ministry said.
Muqdadiya is located about 60 miles (96 kilometers) north of Baghdad.
The attack came a day after America’s top military commander in Iraq reported violence was down significantly across the country — 60 percent in the last six months — but that he was not ready to celebrate.
Gen. David Petraeus told reporters at Baghdad’s Camp Victory that the picture has improved in a number of areas, with progress to report against al Qaeda in Iraq, in thwarting militant attacks and through cooperation with local militias.
But he also sounded a cautionary note.
There’s nobody in uniform who’s doing victory dances in the end zone, Petraeus said. We see this as requiring a continued amount of tough work in the fight against al Qaeda in Iraq.
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