Blasts kill at least 20 in Baghdad

BAGHDAD, Dec 26 (Reuters) Three simultaneous car bombs exploded in a busy intersection in a predominantly Shi'ite district in southwestern Baghdad today, killing at least 14 people and wounding scores, Interior and police sources said.

In a separate attack, a roadside bomb in Baghdad's central Bab al-Sharji market killed five people and wounded 15. Three roadside bombs also exploded in quick succession in Sheikh Omar district, killing a police lieutenant colonel and wounding nine people, an Interior Ministry source said.

Television footage showed rescue workers pulling charred bodies from mangled wreckage in Bayaa district, where the car bombs exploded.

Smoke billowed from vehicles which were set on fire. Oranges and bananas from vendors' stalls that were shattered by the blasts lay scattered amid debris and pools of blood.

''There were only passengers and vendors here. Is this the jihad they are fighting?'' one witness said.

Sunni insurgent groups including al Qaeda have launched bomb attacks against markets and other civilian targets in Shi'ite and mixed areas. Such attacks fuel reprisals assaults by Shi'ite militias against Sunni Arabs, deepening Iraq's sectarian cycle of violence.

REUTERS MS VV1609