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Blast kills 17 in last al-Qaida stronghold in Iraq

BAGHDAD - A thunderous blast tore through a vacant apartment building in northern Iraq on Wednesday, killing at least 17 civilians and wounding more than 130 in adjacent houses just minutes after the Iraqi army arrived to investigate tips about a weapons cache.

Rescue crews searched under toppled walls, collapsed ceilings and piles of debris tossed by the explosion that blew apart the empty building, which Iraqi authorities said was used by insurgents to stash weapons and bombs.

The hunt through the wreckage stretched for hours, and the final casualty toll could climb. The huge blast went off just after the troops arrived, and no soldier was reported killed.

Instead, the explosion ravaged dozens of old homes and collapsed a three-story building in a mostly Sunni neighborhood in Mosul, about 225 miles northwest of Baghdad. The city has a population of roughly 2-million.

The blast also reinforced U.S. claims this week that Mosul - Iraq's third-largest city - is now the last urban center with a strong presence of al-Qaida in Iraq. American and Iraqi forces have been on the offensive against insurgents in and around Baghdad, but Mosul continues to be a center of gravity for al-Qaida in Iraq, according to the military.

In a separate incident, a suicide car bomber targeted a police convoy near the northern city of Kirkuk, killing at least five civilians and wounding 11, police said.

In Baghdad, gunmen fired on Iraqi soldiers resting on the side of a highway, killing three and wounding at least one, according to police and the U.S. military.

No talks: Radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, head of Iraq's most powerful Shiite militia, refuses to hold direct talks with U.S. envoys despite apparent willingness for dialogue by Washington, a Sadr spokesman, Sheik Salah al-Obeidi, said Wednesday.

[Last modified January 24, 2008, 01:43:24]