At least 12 dead in twin car bombings in Baghdad

BAGHDAD (AFP) - At least 10 people were killed when a car bomb ripped through the entrance of an Iraqi army recruitment centre in Baghdad, while a second bomb exploded near a hotel used by foreign workers killing at least two people.
Adding to the carnage, a top official at Iraq's science and technology ministry was shot dead along with a female civil servant by unknown attackers, an official said.
Desperate to crush a deadly insurgency that has raged since soon after last year's US-led invasion, US warplanes bombed suspected rebel positions in the insurgent enclave of Fallujah, killing nine people.
At the army recruitment centre in Baghdad, hundreds of young men, some already signed up to join the army and others hoping to enlist, had been waiting inside when the car bomb detonated.
"It was a car bomb that went off at the entrance of the recruitment centre," said Iraqi army Lieutenant Mohamed Abdallah at the scene of the carnage.
Blood was splattered on the ground at the nearby Yarmuk hospital where cars and trucks sped in and out, ferrying the casualties from the blast site, which had been quickly cordoned off by Iraqi security forces.
Doctor Firas al-Amin said at least 10 people died and 76 were wounded but he warned the figures could rise significantly.
"Our wards are working at full capacity. We are trying to cope with the situation, but it is really horrible," he said.
Inside, young men, some with horrific wounds, were screaming in agony and grief.
"I came here with 109 of my colleagues from Najaf, we were told to bring relevant papers to sign up to a new special force in the army," said Wafi Mohamed, 32, slapping his head as he waited outside the emergency room.
"Oh my God where are my friends?" asked the young man from the holy city south of Baghdad, which had been the scene of heavy fighting in August between US troops and rebel fighters loyal to the radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr.
Another young man, Mohamed Jassem, 25, lay wailing, his legs fractured.
"I was blown away by the impact of the blast," Jassem yelled as a group of friends tried to comfort him.
Raed Majid, 31, described how Monday had been his first day on the job and he had gone to the centre with about 400 new recruits and other people hoping to enlist.
A US army spokesman said the bomb had exploded just after 8:45 am (0545 GMT) outside the Green Zone in Baghdad that houses key Iraqi government buildings and the US embassy, but there had been no US casualties.
The army recruitment centre is adjacent to the Green Zone.
A second car bomb rocked the centre of Baghdad at about 9:30 am (0630 GMT), sending a thick column of smoke into the sky.
The blast, which struck 100 metres (yards) away from the Baghdad Hotel -- a place often used by Westerners -- ripped through several nearby vehicles, including an all-terrain vehicle of the sort used by many expatriates here, an AFP correspondent on the scene said.
Iraqi police and US soldiers immediately blocked off the surrounding area, as American helicopters buzzed overhead.
Rebels opposed to the interim Iraqi government of Prime Minister Iyad Allawi have used car bombs, kidnappings and assassinations, frequently targeting the security forces and high profile officials, in a bid to make the country ungovernable.
Earlier, Thamer Abdellatif, one the general directors at the science ministry, and a civil servant, Ikhlas Ghalib, were shot dead in Baghdad, interior ministry spokesman Colonel Adnan Abdelrahman said.
US and Iraqi officials blame the Jordanian-born militant Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi for some of the deadliest attacks.
In a bid to flush out his network of supporters, US warplanes mounted two pre-dawn raids on Fallujah, a town west of Baghdad that has been a no-go zone for ground troops since April, targeting what US commanders said were Zarqawi safehouses.
Doctor Adel Khamis of Fallujah general hospital said that the second of the two strikes killed nine people, three of them women and two children.
But a military statement said US forces "conducted a precision strike against a building where approximately 25 Anti-Iraqi Forces network members (US terminology for insurgents) were moving weapons on the outskirts of Fallujah."
In a second raid, "Multi-National Force-Iraq once again struck members of the Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi terrorist network operating in central Fallujah," the military said.
The bombings mirrored three similar attacks on the Sunni Arab rebel bastion since Friday night.