Two people were killed in a car bomb attack while a third man was beaten to death by a mob after the blast targeting a hotel in Iraq’s main southern city of Basra, Iraqi police and medical sources revealed. "We have received two dead and one man who was beaten by the crowd who died on arrival at the hospital," said Manal Nassrah, an emergency doctor at Basra’s Al-Sadr university hospital.
| "Of course, we didn't pay much attention until he did kick the bucket. Whoever woulda expected that to happen?" |
The wounded counted a nine-year-old boy and two middle-aged men who were lightly wounded, the doctor said Thursday. Earlier, police officer Ali Radi Zaer told AFP: "Two people were killed and one wounded in the explosion of a Mercedes car near Buraq hotel on Al-Istiqlal street in the city center." But a coalition spokeswoman in Basra, Paola Della Casa, said a British military on patrol in the area at the time believed it was a roadside bomb. "The report is so far an IED (improvised explosive device)," she said, adding it was under investigation. She put the casualty toll at two wounded. Shortly after the explosion, a crowd seized a man and beat him up.
| Hurrah for the crowd! Normally, I disapprove of mobs, but I'm making an exception... |
The apparent suspect, an unidentified man, was wounded and taken away by police in an ambulance, they said. British coalition forces, which control the city, and Iraqi police cordoned off the area, preventing journalists from approaching the site. Firefighters put out the fire in the car which exploded meters away from the newly-renovated three-floor hotel, which caters mainly to Iraqis. |