Two Bombs Kill Nearly 60 People, Injure Scores in Iraq

Abdullah Jabar al-Qaisi, one of the people wounded in Baqubah, said he had been heading to court to fill out paperwork to secure the release of his brother.

"I heard a loud Wham! that lifted me to the air and threw me back on the ground," he said. "I saw body pieces and human bodies flying and slapping the ground."

Jassem Muhsin Alwan, a doctor at a Baqubah hospital, said more than 85 people were being treated there. "Many families are still coming around looking for their sons," he said.

The attacks came shortly after the release of a recorded message attributed to Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, the leader of the Islamic State of Iraq, a Sunni umbrella organization believed to have been founded by al-Qaeda in Iraq. The message was uploaded on a Web site frequently used by the Islamic State of Iraq to communicate with its followers.

The message urged people to break ties with Iraqi security forces and Awakening councils, groups made up of Sunnis who oppose extremists. It encouraged supporters to step up attacks against U.S. forces and also Iraqis working with them. The authenticity of the message could not be confirmed.

U.S. military officials in Baqubah said violence in the area has dropped by 80 percent since June. Capt. Stephen Bomar, a U.S. military spokesman, called the bombing a "random act of violence from a desperate enemy."

In Ramadi, at least 10 people were killed when a suicide bomber detonated explosives inside a restaurant, according to Tariq Yousif al-Asal al-Dulaimi, a police commander. "University students and policemen usually attend this restaurant," he said.

A patron who was injured in that attack said the bomber walked into the restaurant wearing a dishdasha, a long tunic commonly worn by Arab men. A waiter invited him to take a seat anywhere he wanted.

After screaming "God is great," the bomber "blew himself up," said the diner, Fawzi Mohammed al-Swedawi, 43.

In Mosul, where U.S. officials said members of al-Qaeda in Iraq have gathered after leaving other parts of the country, a roadside bomb exploded near an Iraqi police checkpoint at approximately 3:45 p.m. as a U.S. military convoy was passing through, a U.S. military spokeswoman said. As the first responders approached the scene, a car bomb exploded. Three Iraqi policemen and 15 civilians were wounded.

"The enemy continues to maim innocent civilians and harm those trying to come to their aid," Maj. Peggy Kageleiry, a U.S. military spokeswoman, said by e-mail. "It's cruel and inhuman, and despite this, new recruits are continuing to come into" Iraqi security forces.

In the central Baghdad district of Rusafa, a car bomb wounded 11 people, the U.S. military said.

Meanwhile, in Karbala, south of Baghdad, suspected Shiite militia members kidnapped six Iraqi soldiers, said Rahman Imshawir, a police spokesman in the city.

Five of the soldiers were killed and showed signs of torture, according to Salim Kadhim, the director of Karbala's health department.

"We have received five dead bodies of the soldiers," he said. "Their arms and legs were broken, and they were shot in the head and the chest."

In the south, three aides to Iraq's top Shiite cleric, Grand Ayatollah Ali Sistani, escaped assassination in separate attacks Tuesday, although two of them were seriously wounded, the Associated Press reported.

Special correspondents Zaid Sabah, K.I. Ibrahim and Naseer Nouri in Baghdad and Saad Sarhan in Najaf contributed to this report.