EU signs trade pact with southeast African nations

BAGHDAD – Two truck bombs struck separate communities north of Iraq's capital on Saturday, killing at least 16 people in the latest attacks to indicate that insurgents are targeting relatively unprotected areas.

Iraqi security forces have focused on defending cities after the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from urban areas nearly two months ago. But a recent series of high-profile bombings has killed hundreds in remote areas as well as cities and has raised concerns Iraqi forces are not up to the task of protecting the population.

Saturday's deadliest attack came at about 8 a.m. when a suicide truck bomber attacked a small police station in the remote village of Hamad north of Baghdad, killing at least 12 people, including six police, said officials from the Iraqi army and police.

Police attempted to stop the truck, opening fire and forcing the attacker to change direction and slam into a concrete barrier near a market, they said. The blast damaged the police station and a number of nearby homes and shops, the officials said. Fifteen people were also wounded in the attack, said the police official.

Hamad is a primarily Sunni village on the edge of Shirqat, a town between Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit and Mosul, which the U.S. military considers to be the last urban stronghold of al-Qaida in Iraq.

Iraqi police defused a car bomb in the same area three days earlier, said Shirqat's police chief, Ali al-Jubouri.

"I think this attack is in retaliation for what we did," he said.

The second attack targeted a market near Mosul in the city of Sinjar. A parked truck bomb that exploded at about 10:15 a.m. killed at least four people and wounded 23 others, police said.

A double suicide bombing earlier this month in Sinjar devastated a cafe packed with young people in northwestern Iraq, killing at least 21 people.

The city, which is dominated by members of the Kurdish-speaking Yazidi religious minority, was also hit by four suicide truck bombers nearly simultaneously, killing as many as 500 Yazidis, on Aug. 14, 2007.

Iraqi forces have stepped up security in Baghdad and other cities in Iraq since an Aug. 19 double suicide truck bombing in the Iraqi capital that targeted the foreign and finance ministries. About 100 people were killed.

But remote villages often depend on a small security force for protection. Bombers have been exploiting that vulnerability in villages surrounding Mosul, mainly targeting ethnic minorities.

While there were no immediate claims of responsibility for Saturday's attacks, suicide vehicle bombings are the hallmark of al-Qaida in Iraq. A front group for the terrorist organization has claimed responsibility for the recent ministry bombings.

Iraq has demanded Syria hand over two suspects wanted in those bombings, raising tension between the two countries that led each side to recall their respective ambassadors.

"We are dealing with the crisis, containing it and preventing any further escalation or tension," Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari said Saturday during a news conference with Iranian Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki.

Mottaki said Iran would work with both countries, who are its allies, to resolve the tension.

"We will spare no efforts to offer support," he said.

Zebari said Iraq's government plans to ask the United Nations to back the creation of an international court to try those accused in the Baghdad bombings.

Saturday's attacks came as thousands of mourners gathered in the streets of the holy city of Najaf, south of Baghdad, for the arrival of the body of Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, one Iraq's most powerful Shiite leaders, who died Wednesday of lung cancer in Iran.

The casket's arrival ended a three-day mourning tour through Iran, Baghdad and other portions of Iraq's Shiite heartland. The Iranian foreign minister attended the burial.

Al-Hakim led the Iranian-backed Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council, Iraq's largest Shiite party, and was widely revered for helping pave the way for the re-emergence of Shiite power after decades of oppression under Saddam Hussein's Sunni-led regime.

The wooden coffin was buried next to al-Hakim's brother, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, who led the party until he was killed in a car bombing in Najaf soon after the brothers returned to Iraq in 2003 after years in exile.

In his will, al-Hakim called for peaceful coexistence among Iraq's fractured sects, warning that national unity was being targeted by Saddam loyalists and Sunni extremists.

"They see that the only way to achieve their victory is by creating sedition between Iraqi Shiite and Sunnis," he said in the will, which was read by his son and anointed successor, Ammar, at the funeral service.

He also urged Iraqis to vote in January's parliamentary elections, which are likely to be bitterly contested between his party and a rival faction led by Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

Also Saturday, Kurdish authorities distributed 850,000 copies of a proposed constitution along with food rations in Sulaimaniyah, one of three provinces in the Kurds' northern self-ruled region. The move is seen as a step in reviving a referendum on the constitution that Iraq's election commission prevented from occurring in July.

Arabs see the draft constitution as an effort by Kurds to expand their region, escalating tension between the two groups that is seen as a major threat to Iraqi stability.

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Associated Press Writers Sinan Salaheddin and Bushra Juhi in Baghdad and Yahya Barzanji in Sulaimaniyah contributed to this report.

Powerful Iraqi Shiite leader dies in Iran

BAGHDAD – Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim, the scion of a revered clerical family who channeled rising Shiite Muslim power after the fall of Saddam Hussein to become one of Iraq's most influential politicians, died Wednesday in Iran, the country that was long his key ally. He was 59.

The calm, soft-spoken al-Hakim, who died of lung cancer, was a kingmaker in Iraq's politics, working behind the scenes as the head of the country's biggest Shiite political party.

But for many in Iraq's Shiite majority, he was more than that — a symbol of their community's victory and seizure of power after decades of oppression under Saddam's Sunni-led regime. Al-Hakim's family led a Shiite rebel group against Saddam's rule from their exile in Iran, where he lived for 20 years, building close ties with Iranian leaders.

After Saddam's 2003 fall, al-Hakim hewed close to the Americans even while maintaining his alliance with Tehran, judging that the U.S. military was key to the Shiite rise.

Among Iraq's minority Sunnis, he was deeply distrusted, seen as a tool of Shiite Iran. Al-Hakim's outspoken support for Shiite self-rule in southern Iraq was seen by Sunnis and even some Shiites as an Iran-inspired plan to hand Tehran control of Iraq's Shiite heartland, home to most of its oil wealth.

His death comes at a time of political upheaval among Iraq's majority Shiites. The alliance of Shiite parties that al-Hakim helped forge and that has dominated the government since the first post-Saddam elections in 2005 has broken apart ahead of January parliamentary elections, pitting a coalition led by al-Hakim's party against another led by Shiite Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

As al-Hakim largely withdrew from the public arena due to his illness, his son and political heir Ammar has taken the lead in his party, the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council.

Ammar's relative lack of experience has raised some questions over whether he will be able to hold the organization together at a sensitive time in Iraqi politics, but party leaders have insisted they would remain united behind the al-Hakim family.

Ammar announced his father's death in a statement read on his party's al-Forat television station. He said his father, "who spent decades in jihad and struggle, has joined the ranks of the martyrs." The station showed scenes from the elder al-Hakim's life while playing somber music.

Two top aides, Humam Hamoudi and Jalaluddin al-Saghir, told The Associated Press that al-Hakim had been rushed to a hospital in Tehran after his condition deteriorated and died Wednesday. Al-Hakim was diagnosed with lung cancer in May 2007 after tests at the prestigious University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. He chose to receive his chemotherapy treatment in Iran.

Deputy parliament speaker, Shiite Khalid al-Attiyah, described his death as a loss for Iraq.

"We offer our condolences to all the Iraqi people for the death of al-Hakim. He is one of the symbols of Iraq ... we hope political leaders will continue his work."

The Kurds, who allied with the Shiite coalition al-Hakim built, said his death was a loss to those who worked to reconcile Iraq's often warring religious and ethnic factions.

"He had a significant role in Iraq's national unity and was working hard to narrow the different opinions among all Iraqis," Fuad Hussein, spokesman for Kurdish Regional President Massoud Barzani told The AP. "We hope that all the Iraqi people and their leaders will follow his example and directions and never abandon his ideology and path."

Al-Hakim was born in 1950 in Najaf to one of Shiite Islam's most prestigious clerical families. His father was Grand Ayatollah Muhsin al-Hakim, among the most influential Shiite scholars of his generation.

The younger al-Hakim studied theology in Najaf and married the daughter of Mohammed Hadi al-Sadr, member of another prominent Iraqi Shiite clan. After the 1970 death of his father, al-Hakim and his brothers became active in political opposition to Saddam's Baath Party.

He was jailed several times until he and most of the family fled to neighboring Iran in 1980 following a crackdown by Saddam on the Shiite opposition. In Iran, his older brother, Ayatollah Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim, founded the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the forerunner of the SIIC. Abdul-Aziz headed the group's military wing, the Badr Brigade, which fought alongside Iranian forces during the 1980-1988 Iran-Iraq War.

The al-Hakim brothers returned to Iraq soon after the collapse of Saddam's government. On Aug. 29, 2003, a massive vehicle bomb exploded outside the Imam Ali Mosque in Najaf, killing Mohammed Baqir al-Hakim and more than 80 others. Abdul-Aziz stepped into the leadership of the Supreme Council.

The younger al-Hakim lacked his brother's charisma, religious standing or political acumen. But he proved a fast learner and able leader, quickly building the party into Iraq's largest Shiite political organization. He served on the leadership councils formed by the Americans. Then, in the 2005 parliament election, he forged a grand alliance of Shiite parties — backed by Iran's foremost Shiite cleric Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, which swept up a majority.

The coalition allied with the Kurds to form a government, though it constantly struggled to keep Sunni allies.

But signs of fraying among Shiites began to show in key Jan. 31 provincial elections, when members of the coalition competed against each other in the Shiite south. The Supreme Council suffered an embarrassing defeat in much of the south, while al-Maliki — head of the rival Dawa party — surged because of his popularity from security gains. The results were also seen as a voter backlash against religious parties as well as the Supreme Council's failure to improve public services in the south, where it had dominated since 2003.

Two days before al-Hakim's death, his SIIC joined with followers of anti-U.S. cleric Muqtada al-Sadr to form a new political alliance to contest January parliamentary elections. The new Iraqi National Alliance excluded al-Maliki, making overt the new disunity among Shiites.

Al-Hakim is survived by his wife and three other children besides Ammar.

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Associated Press Writers Hamza Hendawi, Sinan Salaheddin and Hamid Ahmed contributed to this report.

Outbursts disrupt Baghdad bank robbery trial

BAGHDAD – Five members of Iraq's security forces charged in a deadly bank robbery went on trial Sunday, as relatives of those killed in the heist beat and spat on the defendants. One relative was dragged away from the courtroom, screaming obscenities.

The case of the robbery has threatened to become a political maelstrom in Baghdad, after at least one of the suspects was linked to a senior official in a major Shiite party.

Gunmen broke into the state-run Rafidain Bank at about 4 a.m. on July 28, killing three on-duty guards and five others on the premises who were either on a break or asleep, according to police investigators. The bank's chief testified Sunday that 5.6 billion Iraqi dinars — or about $4.8 million — was stolen.

Most of the money was later recovered in the office of a newspaper owned by Iraqi Vice President Adel Abdul-Mahdi, a senior member of Iraq's largest Shiite party, investigators said.

Abdul-Mahdi has denied any involvement but said one of those charged in the robbery worked as part of his security detail. He has said any suggestion of wrongdoing on his part was a politically motivated attempt to tarnish his chances in the upcoming national elections.

All five defendants were identified Sunday as members of Iraq's security forces — four police officers and one soldier. The men, who were dressed in brown jumpsuits, denied any involvement in the robbery.

It was not immediately clear whether the soldier in custody was a member of Abdul-Mahdi's detail, or whether it was one of the three suspects who police have said remain at large.

As Sunday's hearing opened, two of the defendants yelled at the judge: "We have nothing to do with the robbery."

The judge ordered them to "be silent" and minutes later, a relative of a slain bank guard attacked one of the defendants, beating him and cursing, while another man was forced from the courtroom after screaming obscenities at the men on trial.

A woman, who later identified herself as the mother of one of the slain guards, spat on the defendants as they left the court. She fainted outside the courtroom and was carried away by police.

Relatives were also angry at the chief judge for adjourning the trial at Baghdad's criminal court until Thursday to give the three-judge panel more time to investigate.

The chief judge ordered the five suspects held without bail. The judges were not identified, according to the rules of the court. Judges in Iraq are often targeted for assassination.

Maan Hussein, the head of the bank, told the judges Sunday that about 5.6 billion Iraqi dinars was stolen. Initially, police had said the gunmen made off with 8 billion Iraqi dinars ($6.9 million). Hussein said 263 million dinars (about $223,000) has still not been recovered.

Abbas Hussein, whose brother was killed during the robbery, said outside the courtroom that he wanted swift justice.

"Today's trial should not make us forget the others who are still at large," he said.

Armed robberies targeting banks and jewelry stores have been on the rise, even as Iraqi security forces continue to fight a waning insurgency that remains capable of pulling off attacks.

An American soldier died of injuries sustained during an attack Sunday on a U.S. patrol in Baghdad, the U.S. military said in a statement. It did not identify the Multi-National Division-Baghdad soldier pending notification of next of kin.

The U.S. military did not release any details about the attack, though an Iraqi army official said a roadside bomb struck the patrol just north of Baghdad. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to release the information.

The death raises to at least 4,335 members of the U.S. military who have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

In northern Iraq, gunmen on Sunday attacked a police checkpoint in Mosul, killing one police officer, a police official said. In Baghdad, the Iraqi army rounded up dozens for questioning over Saturday's attack on a police checkpoint in the Azamiyah district that left two officers dead, said another official.

Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity for the same reason as the army official.

The recent violence, including Wednesday's attacks that targeted government buildings in Baghdad, has cast a long shadow for some over Ramadan, the Islamic holy month of fasting.

Ahlam Hussein, 42, who lives in eastern Baghdad, said the attacks tarnished the celebration for her family.

"The tragic situation we live in takes us away from the spiritual and moral significance of Ramadan, especially since this year it came after a bloodbath," she said.

But Hussar Sale, 35, who lives in Baghdad's primarily Sunni neighborhood of Azamiyah, said the fear of more bombings was not keeping him from his Ramadan traditions. "It is an issue every person faces as we challenge terrorism," he said.

Meanwhile, one of Iraq's most powerful Shiite leaders has been hospitalized in Iran after suffering a setback while being treated for lung cancer.

Abdul-Aziz al-Hakim was admitted to the hospital on Saturday after his health deteriorated, according to a statement by his party, the Supreme Islamic Iraqi Council.

Al-Hakim has wielded enormous influence since the 2003 U.S. invasion as head of the biggest Shiite party, maintaining close ties to both the Americans and his Iranian backers.

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Associated Press Writer Bushra Juhi and Chelsea J. Carter contributed to this report.

Iraqi FM: Baghdad bombings possible inside job

BAGHDAD – Iraq's foreign minister said Saturday that those who carried out bombings that targeted government buildings in the Iraqi capital received help to pull off the attacks, possibly from Iraqi security forces.

The comments comes as anger mounts over the bombings that have lead lawmakers to scrutinize the readiness of Iraqi security forces and raised questions about the loosening of security measures in Baghdad.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has ordered security tightened and concrete blast walls to remain around potential targets, reversing an order earlier this month to remove the walls in Baghdad by mid-September.

"Regrettably, we accepted the order to remove concrete walls and removal of a joint checkpoint near the ministry," Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told reporters during a press conference in Baghdad.

The blasts Wednesday primarily targeted government buildings, including the foreign and finance ministries, killing at least 101 people and wounding more than 500.

Zebari said attacks were so well planned and executed that he would not rule out the possible collaboration of members of Iraq's security forces with attackers.

"We will investigate that," he said.

The Iraqi military announced it arrested members of the insurgent cell responsible for the attacks but gave no details about the suspects. Maj. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, the chief military spokesman in Baghdad, said on Iraqi state television only that both attacks were carried out by suicide bombers.

Zebari said the ministry was investigating how the trucks carrying the bombs were allowed to pass into areas where they are banned from traveling.

He said the prime minister ordered the arrest of officers from several branches of Iraq's security forces as part of an investigation into security lapses that allowed the trucks to park near the ministries.

"What has happened, the number of victims and the destruction of government institutions, is a real national disaster," he said.

Zebari said better, stronger security procedures need to be put in place.

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Associated Press Writers Bushra Juhi and Hamid Ahmed contributed to this report.