Baghdad, Iraq — A suicide bomb aimed at a U.S. military convoy tore through a busy downtown square at midday, killing a U.S. soldier and at least six Iraqis and injuring scores of people, while assassins gunned down 10 city police officers in five neighborhoods during a one-hour period.
Across the country, a total of at least 22 Iraqis were killed in acts of violence as Iraqi political leaders continued their meetings on the drafting of the new national constitution.
Insurgents killed a police officer in Baqubah and attacked a minivan of pilgrims traveling to Iran, killing three, according to local police. A judge in Kirkuk narrowly escaped an assassination attempt and a mortar shell exploded in the troubled Dora neighborhood of Baghdad, killing two people and injuring four, according to police reports.
The U.S. military also announced Tuesday that a U.S. Marine had been killed a day earlier in Al Anbar province.
At least 39 Americans and 124 Iraqis have been killed by insurgent attacks over the past two weeks.
U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad, meanwhile, said one of the more divisive ideas floated during discussions of the new constitution, a referendum on independence for Kurdistan, had been ruled out.
A rooftop view shows the scene of a massive suicide car bomb explosion targeting a U.S. military convoy Tuesday in Baghdad, Iraq. Iraqi government officials say six civilians were killed with over 10 injured. An American soldier was also killed and two were wounded in the blast.
Speaking at a news conference, Khalilzad said the Kurds had decided to be "part of Iraq," in effect signaling that there would be no referendum. Previously, some Kurdish politicians had said they wanted a clause in the constitution allowing the region of northern Iraq to hold a vote on independence in the next eight years. The idea of Kurdistan in effect seceding from the rest of the country is anathema to most non-Kurdish Iraqis.
Leaders of the key political parties in the transitional National Assembly met Tuesday as part of their ongoing effort to resolve differences on crucial aspects of the constitution. In the evening, a broader group that included parties without representatives in the legislature joined them.
The talks are expected to continue until the Monday deadline for sending a draft of the constitution to the National Assembly for its consideration. Under the timetable set out in the Transitional Administrative Law, which most of these same leaders signed last year, if the assembly approves the constitution, a nationwide referendum on the document would be held on Oct. 15 and new national elections would occur in mid-December.
The transitional government has missed a number of deadlines in the past, and it was not yet clear whether it will meet the Monday goal.
Tuesday's suicide attack in central Baghdad came at 1:50 p.m. when a car bomb was detonated near a convoy that had stopped at a crowded intersection, the U.S. military said in a statement. Two U.S. soldiers also were wounded in the blast, the statement said.
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