US air raid kills 15 Iraqi civilians

Iraqi civilians bore the brunt Friday of a bloody start to Eid al-Fitr as a US air raid killed 15 women and children and a sinister suicide attack on a playground shocked a northern town.

"Nineteen suspected insurgents and 15 women and children were killed in an operation Thursday in the Lake Tharthar region" northwest of Baghdad, a US military spokesman told AFP in a rare admission of civilian deaths.

The military said it regretted the deaths of the nine children and six women and that an inquiry had been launched into the killings.

Further north in Tuz, near the oil city of Kirkuk, a suicide bomber on Friday exploded a cart of sweets in a crowded playground, killing a child, a father and wounding 20 children, officials said.

Police captain Hiwa Abdullah said the father, who had come to the playground with his children for the Eid al-Fitr festival, said he had tried to prevent the suicide bomber from setting off his explosives but failed.

The attacker survived but one of his legs was torn off in the blast and he was taken to hospital in Kirkuk. Link