40 Dead In Payback

In what is thought to be a retaliation for the killing of 16 at a Baghdad mosque, a suicide bomber blew himself up at a army recruitment center killing 40 and injuring 20.

(AFP)The attack on the Iraqi army base called Tamarat near the town of Tal Afar, close to the Syrian border, was the deadliest single attack in Iraq since a January suicide attack on police recruits in Ramadi.

Amid a swirl of conflicting versions of the events late Sunday, the US military said Iraqi special forces raided a meeting hall in northeast Baghdad being used by an insurgent cell and killed 16 people and detained 18 others.

"This is a lie, we saw unarmed worshippers and we didn't find any Iraqi weapons. This place was just for praying and worshipping and it included different groups of Shiites, including not just Mehdi Army but Dawa Party as well."