23 April 2009 Iraqi suicide attacks

At least eighty people are known to have died in Baghdad when an explosive belt was detonated by a female.[2][3][4] Police were said to have been assisting and administering aid to homeless people in the Basil square in the Alwehda district.[2][3][5] Over fifty people were wounded in the attack.[3] A minimum of six National Police officers were killed, with one police officer describing how he carried off three bodies belonging to his colleagues whose uniforms were "drenched in blood".[3] Five children and two Red Crescent volunteers were counted amongst the dead.[4][6] Thirty-five-year-old Issam Salim, a survivor injured by shrapnel as he waited for a bus, said: "I turned around as I fell to the ground and saw a big fire break out with black smoke. Women and children are crying from pain beside me in the hospital. Some of them suffered burns."[2] The scene in the aftermath of the attack was said to have been marked by chaos.[4][7]

At least forty-eight people, all but two of whom were Iranian pilgrims, were killed and approximately sixty-three others were injured when the New Khanaqin restaurant in Muqdadiyah was targeted at 12:45 pm[2][3][6] The Iranians had paused for lunch as they embarked on a pilgrimage to a Shi'a Muslim religious site in Baghdad.[3][4] Sixty-four-year-old pilgrim, Kadhumi Sadiq, said: "While the waiter was serving us food a powerful explosion took place and the restaurant turned black. I suffered burns on my head, chest and hands".[3] The restaurant was left demolished in the aftermath of the attack.[2]

Abdulnasir al-Muntasirbillah, the recently sworn-in mayor of the region, visited the local hospital, describing the scene as "catastrophic" and the attack as dirty and cowardly.[4]