By KUNA
Baghdad : A heavy explosion of a booby-trapped oil truck killed four soldiers and caused a total blackout to the country’s northern areas on Monday.
Aziz Sultan, the official spokesman of the Ministry of Electricity, told Kuwait News Agency (KUNA) that an explosion of a booby-trapped truck near Al-Mosul power plant killed four soldiers and caused interruption of high-voltage energy plant.
He explained that the Mosul station located in the province of Nineveh feeds the network 400 MW of electric power where its stopped had caused a total blackout.
For his part, spokesman for the command of Mosul Brigadier Khalid Abdul Sattar in contact with (KUNA) here said that the booby-trapped truck that exploded had fuel tanks at the end of it.
Abdel-Sattar said, a suicide bomber attempted to enter the city from Al-Sahaji area west of Mosul but soldiers at the security barrier suspected him and ordered him to stop but he refused their demands and continued on his way prompting soldiers to open fire on the tank before the suicide bomber was able to blow himself up.
Meanwhile, two big blasts rocked the Iraqi Capital, Baghdad, Monday and columns of smokes were seen hovering over Al-Karada area, southern Baghdad.
An Iraqi Police officer told KUNA, from the scene, that the first was a booby-trapped truck explosion near Freedom Square. The second followed shortly after nearby, he said. This blast caused a nearby building to collapse, sources said.
While smoke was seen rising over the scene of the first blast followed by machine gunfire, and the second blast soon followed.
Witnesses said the two explosions targeted headquarters of key Iraqi officials.
A witness said Civil Defense teams headed to the headquarters of the parliament’s majority party of Abdelaziz Al-Hakim and the headquarters of MP Methal Al-Alousi.
Tribal leader of Al-Dulaim clan Ali Hatim Al-Sleiman told KUNA over the phone that he was the target of the attack and that his office was severely damaged while he himself sustained light injuries.
The casualties’ toll of the two blasts reached six killed and 28 injured, according to medical sources.
Al-Kindi Hospital’s Emergency Room received one body and eight severely injured, including a woman, the Hospitals’ Manager Dr. Karim Bahar Nada told KUNA.
Meanwhile, Director of Ibn Al-Nafis Hospital told KUNA that the Hospital received five killed and 20 injured.
In another development, US Defence Secretary Robert Gates said Monday in Baghdad that a break in proceedings of the withdrawal of US forces from Iraq after the current reduction is completed in July “makes sense”.
Gates, who met with top US Commander in Iraq General David Petraeus, who recommended the “pause” and Iraqi National Security advisor Mowaffaq Al-Rubaie earlier, said that the withdrawal was sensible after 22,000 US troops had returned home and that the war against al-Qaeda was “successful”.
President Bush ordered nearly 30,000 additional US troops into Iraq starting in early 2007. The troop buildup — dubbed “the surge” — has been credited with at least temporarily easing the wave of violence in the country in the previous months.
Gates arrived in the Iraqi capital on Sunday for a previously unannounced visit, his seventh since he took the job in December 2006. He departed Monday.