Suicide bomber kills 19, wounds 60 at Iraqi funeral

Elsewhere, police uncovered another mass grave holding 31 bodies.
WASHINGTON POST
MOSUL, Iraq -- A suicide bomber blew himself up Thursday during a funeral ceremony at a Shiite mosque in this northern city, killing at least 19 people and injuring at least 60, witnesses and local hospital officials said.
They said the 5:30 p.m. blast occurred at the al-Shahidain al-Sadir Mosque when a man detonated an explosive belt he was wearing in a tent next to the mosque where mourners were gathering for dinner. Television footage showed white plastic chairs overturned and personal effects scattered on a dirt floor soaked in blood.
Mosul, one of the largest cities in Iraq, has been a center of sectarian strife and the site of numerous assassinations of security officials and other killings, including a suicide bombing in a U.S. military mess tent on Dec. 21 that killed 22 people, including 15 American service members. A mainly Sunni Arab and Kurdish city, its population also includes Christians, Shiites and Sunni Turks.
Thursday's bombing occurred at a funeral for Hashim Mahmoud Aaraji, a well-known religious figure in Mosul and a professor at Mosul University.
Omar Farooq Talib, a spokesman at Jamhuri Hospital, said the hospital received 19 bodies after the blast and treated 45 injured people. About 15 other victims were treated at other hospitals, officials said. Some news accounts put the death toll as high as 47.
Mass grave
Earlier Thursday, police in Mosul uncovered a mass grave containing 31 bodies, adding to a grisly toll of about 40 decapitated and executed people found at two locations in Iraq on Wednesday, a senior Iraqi police official said.
The bodies were discovered in a common grave at the Wadi Egab Cemetery, according to an Iraqi police general who commands a special antiterrorism unit called al-Theeb, which means "the wolf." He said police were led to the grave by a former police lieutenant, Shoqayer Fareed Sheet, who confessed on Iraqi television Wednesday night to killing 113 people.
The police commander, who because of the sensitivity of his job is publicly identified only as Gen. Abu Waleed, said the bodies were believed to be those of civilians, police officers and army soldiers who had been tortured and killed by Sheet, a Sunni Muslim, to obtain information that was turned over to Sunni insurgent groups.
Government in negotiations
Shiite Arab and Kurdish leaders continued negotiations Thursday over an agreement that would pave the way for the formation of a new government, sources on both sides said. Major progress has been made in recent days, they said, but crucial details still have to be worked out.
Some of the issues being discussed include the integration of the Kurdish militia into Iraq's armed forces; how decisions in the cabinet will be made; and the future of Kirkuk, a Kurdish city that was repopulated with Arabs during Saddam Hussein's rule. The discussions also have focused on the Islamic character of the future government.