Bombers kill 41 in strikes on Iraqi forces

Bombers killed 41 people in two strikes on Iraq's fledgling security forces yesterday, stepping up a bloody drive to sabotage plans for US-led occupation to give way to Iraqi rule on June 30.

A suicide bomber blew up his white four-wheel-drive car at an army recruiting base in Baghdad, killing 35 people and wounding 138, in Iraq's deadliest single bombing since a suicide attack on the same target killed 47 in February.

Later yesterday a car bomb killed six paramilitary civil defence guards and wounded four near the town of Balad, north of the Iraqi capital, the US military said.

Insurgents, thought to include Baathists loyal to Saddam Hussein, Iraqi nationalists and foreign Islamist militants, have attacked the oil industry, government officials and security forces in the runup to the June 30 handover.

Oil exports, Iraq's economic lifeblood, remained paralysed yesterday after sabotage attacks on pipelines in the north and south. But an oil official said some exports could resume today after repairs to a pipeline to a Gulf terminal.

Passersby and army volunteers took the brunt of the Baghdad blast, the city's third suicide bombing this week.

Iraqis hoping to join the nascent army were waiting outside the base when hot shrapnel scythed through the air.

"Suddenly there was a huge explosion. Ten or 15 others were on top of me on the street. I can't go back. No way," said army volunteer Ibrahim Ismail from his hospital bed.

"This was a cowardly attack. It is a demonstration again that these attacks are aimed at the stability of Iraq and the Iraqi people," Prime Minister Iyad Allawi said at the scene.

Iraq's new defence minister promised a military crackdown on insurgents. "We will cut off their hands and behead them," Hazim al-Shaalan said. Iraqi forces would lead the raids, with only logistical help from US troops, he added.

Visiting US Deputy Defence Secretary Paul Wolfowitz said Iraqi security forces would need "substantial help" for some time and US troops would stay in Iraq as long as necessary.

But an opinion poll conducted for the US-led authority since a prison abuse scandal became public found that 55 per cent of Iraqis would feel safer if US troops left the country now.

Interior Minister Falah al-Naqib blamed suicide attacks on foreigners. "These bombings are not being done by Iraqis," he said. "I think there is some link to Zarqawi."

The US military blames a group led by Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, with suspected links to al Qaeda, for orchestrating much of the violence roiling Iraq.

A Saudi member of Zarqawi's group carried out a suicide bombing in Baghdad that killed 13 people, including five foreign contractors on Monday, the man's brother said.