Suicide car bomber kills 11 in Iraq's Najaf

Najaf (Iraq), Feb 21: A suicide car bomb exploded at a police checkpoint near a busy market in the holy Shi'ite city of Najaf today, killing 11 people, a doctor at a local hospital said.

Dr Riyadh al-Shibli said the hospital was also treating 38 wounded people.

Captain Hadi al-Najafi, an explosives expert, said police had been searching the bomber's car when it exploded. He said four policemen and three civilians, two of them women, were killed.

The bodies of a woman and a young child lay near the mangled wreckage of the car. The charred corpse of the bomber was nearby.

With a few major exceptions, Najaf, home to Iraq's most senior cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, has been spared much of the violence rocking Baghdad and other areas where Shi'ites, Sunni Arabs and ethnic Kurds live side by side.

The US military transferred Najaf province to Iraqi forces last December, though the move was largely symbolic as it had been largely under Iraqi control for some time because of religious sensitivities.

The holy city is home to the shrine of Imam Ali, whose death in the 7th century caused the great schism in Islam between Shi'ites and Sunnis.

Reuters