Soldiers targeted by bombers as 50 die in Iraq

BAGHDAD, Aug 1 (Reuters) Bombings and shootings killed up to 55 people today, including at least 23 Iraqi soldiers, undermining the new government's attempts to convince Iraqis it could improve security.

A roadside bomb attack on a bus filled with troops on a road between Tikrit and Baiji, north of Baghdad, killed at least 23, the army said.

A British soldier was killed in a mortar attack on an army base in the southern city of Basra, a British military spokesman said.

In Baghdad, a suicide bomber in a car targeted soldiers collecting their salaries from a bank and at least 10 people, including an elderly woman, died, police said. State television put the toll at 14.

The attack took place at the same spot in the district of Karrada where a car bomb and mortars killed at least 27 people last week.

''We should carry guns to protect ourselves. If we expect Iraqi security forces to protect us we will burn, just like those innocent people,'' said kiosk owner Abu Fadhil, surveying charred bodies.

''The government is useless. Only days ago we suffered from a huge blast here. The interior minister has to admit they lost the war against the terrorists.'' A Reuters reporter saw bodies that were charred or ripped apart by the blast lying on the street which is lined with shops. A boy, about 12 years old, stood in the street sobbing and tearing his shirt after seeing his dead mother.

''My mother, my mother, my mother,'' he screamed, as people held him back from reaching her corpse.

Two months after being sworn in, Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki has yet to prove he can end such scenes of carnage and ease sectarian violence which has raised fears of civil war.

SHORT ON DETAILS He has presented a 24-point reconciliation plan that is long on promises and short on details and imposed a security crackdown in Baghdad that has failed to ease the bloodshed.

The United States plans to boost its troop levels in Baghdad in a bid to improve security but long-term stability, and an American withdrawal, depends on the performance of Iraqi forces.

National Security Advisor Mowaffaq al-Rubaie said extra Iraqi brigades would be brought to Baghdad.

''The fourth brigade will come on August 6 from Salaheddine province and it will be followed by other brigades,'' he told a news conference.

Iraqi security forces were also targeted in the town of Muqdadiya, 90 km northeast of the capital.

A car bomb exploded as a police patrol passed in front of a hospital, killing at least seven people and wounding eight, police said.

In the northern oil city of Kirkuk, a roadside bomb killed two police and wounded a third as they conducted a patrol.

Iraq's northern oil pipeline to Turkey was also hit by a sabotage attack, delaying the restart of exports, industry sources said.

REUTERS DKA KN1818