Four suicide attacks kill at least 71 in Iraq

Suicide bombs killed at least 71 people in Iraq yesterday, taking to nearly 400 the number of Iraqis killed in guerilla attacks since a new government was unveiled two weeks ago.

In Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, a suicide car bomber blew up his vehicle among a crowd of mainly Shi'ite migrant labourers from southern Iraq who had gathered to look for work.

Police said at least 33 people were killed and 80 wounded in the attack, one of the day's four suicide bombings.

A policeman at the scene of the blast in Tikrit, 175 kilometres north of Baghdad, said the explosion was near a police station but the target was the crowd of workers.

"What I saw was a tragedy," said Ibrahim Mohammed, a migrant worker from the town of Kut who witnessed the blast. "Some people had their heads torn off by the explosion, some were burned, some were ripped to pieces."

Iraqi militant group Army of Ansar al-Sunna claimed responsibility for the bombing in an Internet statement, saying the migrant labourers were working at nearby US bases. It said the workers were "apostates who sold their religion and became slaves and agents of the crusaders".

Mainly Sunni gurrillas have often targeted Shi'ites, sparking fears they are trying to stoke sectarian civil war.

In the town of Hawija, southwest of the strategic oil city of Kirkuk in northern Iraq, a suicide bomber walked up to an army recruitment centre and detonated an explosive belt, killing at least 32 people and wounding 34, hospital sources said.

A third suicide bomber blew up his vehicle near a police station in the southern Baghdad suburb of Dora, killing at least three civilians. Police said the bomber was trying to reach the police station but blew up his car before he got there.

A suicide car bomb attack on a police patrol in the Mansour district of Baghdad killed two policemen and a civilian, officials at the Interior Ministry said.

Gunmen attacked an Iraqi army patrol in western Baghdad, killing three soldiers, police said. And a mortar round hit the Oil Ministry in Baghdad but there were no casualties.

Insurgents have launched a blitz of attacks since Iraq's political leaders announced a new Cabinet on April 28.

Insurgents have also snatched two more foreign hostages - an Australian engineer captured in Baghdad late last month and a Japanese security contractor seized on Sunday in western Iraq.