Updated at 12:35 p.m. EDT, July 21, 2009
At least 24 Iraqis were killed and 142 more were wounded on a busy day in Iraq. No Coalition deaths were reported, but two sets of Iraq-related groups are headed to Washington to ask for help with their vastly different needs. Meanwhile, the status of Iraqi and Palestinian refugees who fled the war has changed in two particular cases.
Back in the U.S., several caregivers of veterans who served in Iraq are descending on Washington to ask Congress for help. In many cases, servicemembers returned home in such debilitated circumstances that their families had to give up work, college and material needs in order to care for their loved ones. What they want is training and financial help to keep the veterans out of institutional care.
Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki is also en route to the U.S. capital to ask President Obama for help in luring financial investments to Iraq. He is accompanied by a retinue of defense an interior ministers.
Three bombs planted in Sadr City killed eight people and wounded 52 others. The first blast occurred near a food stall and the second in a pile a trash. A group of day laborers appeared to be the target. Later, a third bomb exploded in the Qayara market. An eight-year-old girl and infant sister were among the dead in that blast. There has been much confusion throughout the day as to the location, order and number of blasts. A fourth bomb was defused.
Late in the evening, five people were killed and 29 more were killed during a bombing in Husseiniyah. Two bombs were hidden in trash piles 50 meters apart. They were detonated near simultaneously.
Three people were killed and 13 others were wound by a blast at a restaurant in northern Ramadi.
In Baghdad, 13 people were wounded in the Karrada district as a pair of bombs targeting the water resources minister’s convoy exploded; the minister denied being the target. Two people were killed and six more were wounded during a bombing near a Doura marketplace . A bomb in Bab al-Muadham killed two and wounded 13 who were traveling to a funeral. In Rahmania, a blast wounded five more people. Also, a bombing in Shabb left a U.S. vehicle engulfed in flames and wounded two civilians.
In Mosul, gunmen killed a policeman. A blast targeting an information official in the Raas al-Jada neighborhood, wounded him and a civilian companion. Two soldiers were wounded in a blast in al-Krama. Two traffic policemen were arrested on bribery charges. Gunmen blew up an abandoned home that belonged to a retired brigadier who was assassinated a month ago. Also, four Syrian gunmen were captured.
A woman and her child were killed in Baquba when a bomb hidden in trash exploded.
Five Awakening Council members were injured when a bomb blasted their vehicle in Hilla.
A company manager was killed in a sticky bomb explosion in Taji.
In Dhi-Qar, police confiscated 18 rockets.
An underground weapons cache was found in Numaniya.
Fear of an attack caused officials in Anbar province to impose a province-wide ban. A ban was already in effect in Fallujah.
A police officer in Hadad, Diyala province, was arrested. He was charged with having ties to al-Qaeda and carrying out a fatal bombing.
The general director of the Rabeaa border crossing along with a customs official and his assistant are all out on bail following an arrest on corruption and financial charges.
The United Nations, due to budgetary cuts, has ceased supplying medical aid to Iraqi refugees who relocated to Jordan. Meanwhile, a transit center was opened in Slovakia to help move 98 Palestinian refugees who were trapped in a camp near the Syrian border after the U.S.-led invasion.
In Turkey, excavations are underway in search of 12 missing Kurds who are thought to have been executed and buried at a military base in the southeast.
