40 dead in police station blasts

[CShine]

Near-simultaneous explosions believed to have been caused by car bombs ripped through three police station in the southern Iraqi city of Basra today, killing at least 40 people and injuring some 200, a hospital source said.

At one station in the Saudia district of Basra, four vehicles were seen destroyed including two school buses. At least one of the school buses appeared to have been full of passengers, an Associated Press reporter at the scene said.

The facade of the Saudia station was also heavily damaged and there was a hole two meters (yards) deep and three meters wide in front of the Saudia station.

More than 40 people were killed and at least 200 injured in the blast, said Ali Hussein, an emergency physician at Basra's main hospital.

http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,9345881%255E2,00.html

[shockingelk]

1. how long

How long before a pollyanna suggests that Americans just "change the channel"?

[David Dunham]

2. How long can Bush keep fooling the public about Iraq? Not for long.

[gate of the sun]

3. So how long are us Democrats

going to suppport this killing?

I don't.

Let's stop this illegal war and stop the killing!!!!!

[The Traveler]

6. Good question. (n/t)

[saigon68]

13. It's time to stop the Killing

War----- what is it good for?

[Juansmith]

4. Terrible

The situation isn't getting any better over there...

[truthisfreedom]

5. there will be no solution to this problem while we're stuck in bushville.

when he's out, we might have a chance to do something right.

[wtmusic]

7. If 40 people were killed in the US

it would be a top story for a week.

This is really, really f*cking awful.

[BostonTeaParty04]

8. You read my mind exactly!

If this headline hit the US....

They would preempt everything on TV for on the scene reporting...

Everyone would be talking about it...

It would hit the headlines of all newspapers for a week, as you say.

Diane Sawyer would be advertising her one hour special to speak exclusively to a mother of one of the kindergartners killed...

AND... congress people would be referencing it to bring a sense of sensation to whatever the hellacious bill they wanted to pass that day......

[DeepModem Mom]

9. Sky tv/UK now say 61 dead, incl. 10 children on way to school...

and possible hundreds injured.

[BostonTeaParty04]

10. I read elsewhere that Faux has fatalities at 75. n/t

[DeepModem Mom]

11. This is a really bad one -- I've got no words --

[leftchick]

12. 55 Dead... AP link....

http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&u=/ap/20040421/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq&cid=540&ncid=716





Blasts Rip Iraq Police Stations, Kill 55
1 hour, 24 minutes ago

By ABBAS FAYADH, Associated Press Writer

BASRA, Iraq - A series of explosions ripped through three police stations and a police academy in the southern Iraqi city of Basra Wednesday, killing at least 55 people, including some 10 schoolchildren, and injuring at least 238, officials said.

Three near simultaneous blasts targeted police stations at rush hour in Basra. At about the same time, a fourth explosion ripped through the police academy in the Basra suburb of Zubair. An hour later another blast targeted the same police academy.

Forty-five people were killed in the police station blasts and 10 were killed in the police academy explosions, officials and witnesses said. The injured included two British soldiers at the police academy, Maj. Hisham al-Halawi, spokesman for British forces in Basra, told Al-Arabiya television.

The attacks came a day after Iraqi leaders named a tribunal of judges and prosecutors to try Saddam Hussein (news - web sites), placing a longtime opponent of the ousted dictator in the forefront of the case against him and his former Baathist inner circle.

At one station in the Saudia district of Basra, four vehicles were seen destroyed including two school vans that were passing that station at the time of the attack. One was carrying students from a girls' middle school and the other carried kindergarten students.

[Moderator]

14. dupe

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=show_topic&forum=102&topic_id=500442