Children rushing to collect sweets from American soldiers became the latest victims of Iraqi insurgents as a series of devastating car bombs struck Baghdad yesterday.
Thirty four children were killed, and scores more wounded as two suicide car bombs detonated during the opening ceremony of a sewage treatment plant in Hai al-Amaal, a slum district in the eastern part of the city. A third explosion a few minutes later appeared to target rescuers as they rushed to the scene.
In two further attacks yesterday, a suicide bomber blew up his vehicle near a US checkpoint outside the capital, killing two policemen and a US soldier, while a car bomb killed four people in the restive northern Iraq town of Tal Afar.
In all, 44 people were killed and over 236 injured, officials said.
The attack at the sewage plant was one of the most gruesome in recent months, and comes as Iraq's insurgency plumbs new depths of violence ahead of national elections early next year.
More than 300 Iraqis have been killed so far this month, health ministry officials said. American forces in Iraq are also being attacked a record 80 times a day on average, up from 40 last month.
Iraq's interim Prime Minister, Mr Iyad Allawi, insisted yesterday that "free and fair" elections in Iraq planned for January would take place on time, despite the violence. "We will have those elections on time, next year," the interim Iraqi premier told a gathering at the International Institute for Strategic Studies, a London-based think tank.
Meanwhile, a further 10 people were claimed kidnapped yesterday. A militant group said it had kidnapped the group, who included two Indonesian women, who work for an electronics firm.