Saturday, September 19, 2009 BAGHDAD: Seven people were killed and 21 others wounded by a car bomb just outside Baghdad on Friday evening, a security official said. The bomb exploded in the town of Mahmudiyah, south of Baghdad, at around 6:00 pm (1500 GMT) in a popular market as people were shopping for food to break the fast during the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. The town lies within a confessionally mixed region known as the Triangle of Death because of the frequency of insurgent attacks during the worst of Iraq's insurgency in the wake of the 2003 US-led invasion. The number of violent deaths in Iraq hit a 13-month high in August, raising fresh concerns about stability after the government admitted that security is worsening. Government statistics showed that 456 people -- 393 civilians, 48 police and 15 Iraqi soldiers -- were killed. That was the highest monthly toll since July 2008, when 465 died.
BEIRUT: Thousands of people converged Saturday on central Beirut to mark the fourth anniversary of the assassination of Lebanese former premier Rafiq Hariri.Waving Lebanese flags and carrying pictures of the slain leader, men, women and children gathered under sunny skies in Martyr's Square where members of the parliamentary majority were to address the crowd. The rally comes as final preparations are underway in The Hague for the launch of the international tribunal set up to bring Hariri's killers to justice. It also comes as the country prepares for legislative elections in June that will pit Western-backed political parties against a Hezbollah-led alliance backed by Syria and Iran.Hariri died in a massive car bombing on February 14, 2005 that also killed 22 others. The assassination was widely blamed on then Lebanese power-broker Syria, which has denied any involvement. The attack on the Beirut seafront was one of the worst acts of political violence to rock Lebanon since t...
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