40 killed in Iraq bombings

BAGHDAD, Aug. 24 (UPI) -- At least 40 people died in bombings in Iraq Sunday, including 25 in a suicide attack at an event celebrating a man's release from detention, authorities said.

The suicide bomber in that incident detonated his explosives about 9 p.m. as people were eating and dancing in Abu Ghraib, a primarily Sunni area about 18 miles west of Baghdad, the Los Angeles Times reported. Many of the survivors were reported to be in critical condition.

"Out of the blue, a very loud blast occurred," a farmer, Hameed Salim, told the Times. "All I could hear were screams and shouts. People thought that I was injured because I was covered with blood, but it wasn't from my injuries. It was of others. Only God saved me."

A pair of roadside bombs that detonated minutes apart in Baghdad killed at least three people, officials said. Also, three men were killed when a bomb hidden in a haystack was detonated as they headed to work in the fields southeast of Baghdad before dawn.

Three attacks in Diyala province left nine people, police said.

Meanwhile, the military disclosed Sunday Abdallah Ashur Shujayri, an al-Qaida in Iraq member suspected of engineering the abduction of U.S. journalist Jill Carroll in 2006, had been taken into custody.