Bombing at bus station kills 22 in Baghdad

A bomb in a parked pickup truck exploded at a crowded bus station here this morning, killing at least 22 people and injuring 35 in the Bayaa neighborhood.

About 40 buses were still on fire an hour after the attack.

Elsewhere, several mortar rounds struck the large wholesale Shorja market, killing at least two people and injuring 14.

Today’s attacks followed bombings, ambushes and shootings that killed nine members of Iraq’s security forces and at least two dozen civilians Wednesday throughout the country.

Most of the violence occurred in the capital, where the U.S. military has boosted troop deployment in an effort to improve security.

A car bomb exploded in the mostly Shiite Muslim neighborhood of Kadhimiya, killing at least 14 people and wounding 21, police said. Kadhimiya was struck June 6 by two nearly simultaneous car bombs that killed at least seven people and wounded about 30.

A roadside bomb in east Baghdad killed a U.S. soldier and wounded four others, the U.S. military said.

A bomb planted under a car near the popular Suleikh market in Baghdad killed three people and injured 10.

A police officer was killed and six bystanders were injured by a suicide car bombing at a checkpoint on a bridge in south Baghdad.

Witnesses said U.S. troops opened fire on civilians in the sprawling Sadr City neighborhood of the capital after a passerby fired a revolver into the air to settle a family dispute. The ensuing gunfire left two men dead and three injured, the witnesses said.

A spokesman for the U.S. military said he had not received reports of soldiers firing at civilians. A military police unit was in Sadr City to deliver a generator, the spokesman said.

Members of the unit drew their weapons after they spotted a suspected suicide bomber approaching, then traded shots with about five other men, killing one, the spokesman said.

In west Baghdad, police said gunmen opened fire on a bus headed to the southern holy city of Najaf, injuring five, including the driver. Militants also shot and killed two farmers driving to Baghdad from the northern city of Balad to sell vegetables.

Police recovered the bodies of 21 unidentified men in the capital, all shooting victims. Most were dumped in west Baghdad.

But Wednesday’s violence was not confined to the capital.

In one attack, four Iraqi police commandos were killed and three injured by a bomb that exploded under their car during a routine patrol in Samarra.

After the explosion, witnesses said outraged officers emerged from the car and began shooting at nearby houses, killing two men and injuring three others.

Abdul-Hameed Abassi, a surgeon at Samarra Public Hospital, was driving to work at the time of the shooting.

“I was driving along with my colleague when the patrol passed us, and suddenly there was a large explosion which lifted their vehicle,” he said.

The surgeon was shot in the stomach and thigh but passersby took him to a nearby hospital.

In the northern city of Kirkuk, four Iraqi policemen were killed and a fifth wounded by gunmen south of the city.

In the southern city of Basra, police said an Iraqi fisherman was killed and two people were injured after an Iranian border patrol opened fire on them while they were fishing at dawn.

Iraq’s minister of culture was still on the run Wednesday, reportedly hiding out in Baghdad’s high-security Green Zone.

Police on Tuesday searched the home of Asad Kamal Hashimi, a Sunni wanted in connection with a 2005 assassination attempt against Mithal Alusi, a secular Sunni member of parliament whose two sons were killed in the attack.

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molly.hennessy-fiske@latimes.com

Times staff writers Said Rifai, Saif Hameed, Wail Alhafith and Raheem Salman in Baghdad and special correspondents in Baghdad, Basra, Kirkuk and Samarra contributed to this report.