Iraqis find 27 bodies near border with Iran

BAGHDAD -- Iraqi Army soldiers near the Iranian border discovered the bound bodies of 27 people in civilian clothes who had been shot in the head, the latest in a series of suspected political killings, officials said yesterday.

Human rights workers and families of victims suspect death squads from either the Shi'ite Muslim majority or the Sunni Arab minority have been carrying out executions of political or sectarian enemies. Bodies have turned up in rivers, in back streets, and in refuse pits in recent months, and the killers are almost never found. The numbers found so far total in the hundreds.

The announcement of the discovery in the town of Jassan, about 80 miles east of Baghdad, came a day before a surprise visit to Mosul by US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice. In her stop in a majority Sunni Arab region of the country, she made a personal appeal for Iraqis to bridge their differences and to cooperate in the coming election.

''I want to talk about the importance of reaching across sectarian lines," Rice said on her unannounced visit to this northern Iraqi city, which is about 60 percent Iraq Arab.

The trip followed a deadly day in Iraq. In addition to the discovery of the bodies, car bombers struck Baghdad and Tikrit, killing about 40 people and injuring about three dozen more.

In Baghdad, two suicide bombers struck a popular restaurant in Baghdad at about 9:30 a.m. during the breakfast rush at an eatery frequented by police and local guards, neighbors and witnesses said.

The dual blasts follow a pattern of attacks against Iraqi army and police personnel and facilities in the past year and a half that have killed hundreds of soldiers, policemen, and recruits, most of whom are from Iraq's majority Shi'ite Arab community. Many of the attacks were staged by Sunni Arab insurgents.

The morning explosion at the Qadouri Restaurant killed 35 people and wounded at least 25, according to an Interior Ministry spokesman.

Police and witnesses said the bomber apparently wore an explosives vest.

''The moment he entered the restaurant, he blew up himself," said Uday Mohammed, 28, a worker at the restaurant who sat at the entrance crying for 12 co-workers he said were killed in the explosion. ''This is hell all over us."

Neighbors of the restaurant said it had been threatened several times because it was popular with police and soldiers.

''Every day, I told the policemen not to eat among the civilians, but they didn't care and said all Iraq is targeted, not only our restaurant," Mohammed said.

The second suicide blast occurred at 11:30 a.m. when a man exploded his car outside an army recruiting center in Tikrit, about 90 miles north of the capital, according to Major Abdul Jabbar Hussein, a secretary to the provincial governor.

Five people were killed and 11 injured in the blast, police and hospital officials said.

Al Qaeda in Iraq took responsibility for the restaurant attack.

Material from the Los Angeles Times and The Washington Post was included in this report.