Scores killed and wounded in Iraq explosion

BASRA, Iraq (Reuters) - The explosion of a power generator, possibly triggered by a bomb, at a busy market in Iraq's southern oil hub Basra on Saturday killed dozens of people and wounded scores more, morgue and security sources said.

A source at the city's morgue said at least 25 bodies had been taken there. A security source who asked not to be identified said the toll was 45 killed and 162 wounded while a hospital source said 16 had died and at least 110 were wounded.

Witnesses reported that two or three explosions struck the popular market in the center of Basra and two security sources said at least one of the blasts was the detonation of a car bomb. Basra Police Chief Adil Daham told al-Hurra television the explosion was caused by a malfunctioning generator.

"We're investigating the cause. We don't know whether it was a terrorist attack or something else," said Ali al-Maliki, the head of the security committee in the Basra council.

Firefighters and ambulances rushed to the scene, the central al-Ashaar market in one of Iraq's largest cities. Fierce flames and smoke could be seen.

"There were three explosions in this very crowded area," lawmaker Hussein Talib told Reuters television at the scene. "There were women and children and poor vendors."

"As a lawmaker from Basra I hold the military and police leadership responsible for the blood that has been shed."

Oil-rich Iraq has remained in a political void since an inconclusive March 7 election while Shi'ite, Sunni and Kurdish political factions try to sort out a coalition government.

Politicians and security officials say insurgents appear to be trying to take advantage of the power vacuum.

Overall violence has ebbed since the peak of sectarian warfare in 2006/07 but bombings and suicide attacks still occur regularly. Iraq has the world's third-largest oil reserves and most of its exports come from oilfields located around Basra.

A man at the scene of the explosions blamed politicians, who have failed in their attempts to form a government in the five months since the election.

"They are all fighting over their chairs. Is that what they want? Explosions in Basra, another one in Mosul. Oh my God, why is this happening?" the man, Furat Yasir, said.

More than a dozen people were killed in other attacks across Iraq on Saturday, including four policemen in clashes with gunmen in Baghdad during a raid on a house where car bombs were being made. In the northern city of Mosul a suicide bomber killed a policeman and wounded six other people.

Nearly 400 civilians were killed in bombings and other attacks in July, almost double the June toll, Iraqi authorities say.

Tens of thousands of people were killed during the height of Iraq's sectarian slaughter in 2006-07.

(Additional reporting by Waleed Ibrahim; Writing by Ulf Laessing and Jim Loney; Editing by Peter Graff)