A suicide bombing against army recruits and a string of other attacks on Tuesday left at least 29 people dead across Iraq, with al Qaeda and its allies claiming responsibility for much of the new bloodshed. A suicide bomber walked into a line of soldiers and recruits in Baghdad killing at least 15 of them, while gunmen killed two sons and the bodyguard of an outspoken politician.
Four Egyptians who spent 36 hours in the hands of kidnappers celebrated their freedom but renewed doubts arose about the fate of an Italian journalist abducted last Friday.
Al Qaeda said one of its militants walked into a crowd of Iraqis waiting to enlist at a Baghdad base and set off an explosive belt. Two soldiers and 13 recruits were killed, an interior ministry official said.
"I came to Baghdad from Hilla with two friends to join the army," said Mohammed Abdel Hussein, 22, who suffered a head wound. "We were queuing with several other young people when there was an enormous explosion in the middle of the group."
The attack was the latest in a wave of strikes targeting Iraqi security forces since the country's landmark January 30 elections.
In another deadly attack in the capital Tuesday, gunmen sprayed gunfire on the car of Mithal al-Alusi, an outspoken politician who favours normalising ties with Israel.
"Yes, my two sons died and my bodyguard as well. It was a gunfire attack on my car near my house," said the 52-year-old Alusi told AFP, adding that he believed he was the target.
Alusi, who escaped a grenade attack last month, was waiting for his car when the gunmen opened fire on the vehicle.
After he became the first Iraqi politician to visit Israel, Alusi and his Democratic Party of the Iraqi Nation were expelled from the Iraqi National Congress, the party of the maverick Ahmed Chalabi.
"I will repeat it, even if these terrorists try to kill me again, peace is the only solution. Peace with Israel is the only solution for Iraq. Peace with everybody, but no peace for the terrorists," said a shell-shocked Alusi.
Eleven other people were killed in northern Iraq.
Four Iraqis were killed by bombs in Salahedin province, and Ansar al-Sunna, an al Qaeda ally, said in an Internet statement that it had killed an Iraqi it accused of working for US forces.
The bodies of two other people who worked on US bases were found near Tikrit, Saddam Hussein's hometown.
At Mosul, Iraq's third largest city, two members of the Kurdistan Democratic Party were shot dead, while Iraqi soldiers killed two civilians who did not stop at a checkpoint near Baiji.
In further possible proof of the former regime's involvement in current violence, the Iraqi government said it had arrested last month Bashir Matar al-Tikriti, a relative of Saddam's.
Amid the unrest, more details from the election count showed the United Iraqi Alliance, backed by Shia spiritual leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani, was set to win more than half of the seats in the new 275-member national assembly.
Though its share has fallen to about 51 percent of the vote, it should still secure an absolute majority in the assembly as many of the votes still to be counted are from Shiite strongholds in the south.
In a speech in Paris, meanwhile, new US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice on Tuesday urged Europe to "stand ready to work with America" despite differences over the war in Iraq.
"America stands ready to work with Europe on our common agenda, and Europe must stand ready to work with America," her speech read. "It is time to turn away from the disagreements of the past."
The bodies of 10 British servicemen who were on a transport plane that crashed north of Baghdad last month arrived back in Britain.
Militant groups have claimed they shot down the plane on January 30, causing Britain's largest single-day loss of life in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion. Authorities are still investigating the crash.