BAGHDAD (AFP) - At least 11 people were killed, including a US soldier and an Iraqi policewoman, and six wounded in two explosive attacks that rocked Baghdad.
Witnesses said rockets caused the first blast near Iraq`s oil ministry and a police accademy, but a ministry official blamed a car bomb.
"We have six bodies and three bags containing pieces of flesh that make up three or four more people," said Imad Abdel Latif, a doctor at the nearby Kindi hospital. One of the dead was a policewoman, he added.
Oil ministry spokesman Assem Jihad said however that 17 people died.
Citing the department`s security officials, Jihad said a black car blew up as people headed to work and that seven women were among the dead.
Bits of flesh and personal belongings, such as a woman`s purse, lay scattered on the ground after the blast at around 7 am (0400 GMT), which also shattered the screens of several cars parked close by and left a metre-deep (three foot) hole in the road.
The heavily-fortified oil ministry building on the northeast side of the capital is the target of frequent mortar and missile attacks by insurgents.
Elsewhere in the capital, a car bomb exploded in the central Zayyuna district, killing the vehicle`s driver and a US soldier, police and the military said.
The US army also announced the death of a marine in al-Anbar province, raising the number of soldiers killed in Iraq since the 2003 invasion to 1,065.
The two attacks were claimed in a statement posted on an Islamic website purported to be from wanted Jordanian militant Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi`s Unity and Holy War group.