Car bomb kills 33 in Iraq, Gates visits Baghdad

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - A suicide car bomb killed 33 people in Iraq on Sunday, a security official said, hours before U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates arrived in Baghdad to assess recent security gains and discuss troop levels.

The bomber struck a checkpoint outside a crowded market near the town of Balad in the country's north, said Colonel Hamadi Atshan, a spokesman for Iraqi security forces in the area.

The checkpoint was run by Sunni Arab volunteers who have joined U.S. forces to fight al Qaeda, Atshan said, adding women and children were among those killed in one of the worst attacks in Iraq this year. The U.S. military put the death toll at 23.

"There was a big explosion near the checkpoint. I saw blood, clothes, children's shoes and other personal things strewn on the ground," said Mustafa Kamal, a member of the volunteer security force and who was wounded in the attack.

Gates told reporters he would discuss troop levels with the U.S. military commander in Iraq, General David Petraeus.

Petraeus is expected to testify to the U.S. Congress in April about possible further cuts in American forces in Iraq should recent drops in violence be sustained.

"I will obviously be interested in hearing from General Petraeus about his evaluation -- where he stands and what more work he feels he needs to do before he's ready to come back with his recommendations," Gates said.

Gates is visiting Baghdad a year after a U.S.-Iraqi security offensive was launched with the aid of an extra 30,000 U.S. troops to halt the country's slide into all-out sectarian war.

Security has improved since the additional forces were fully deployed in June, allowing the U.S. military to start withdrawing some troops.

By July, U.S. force levels will have dropped by five brigades, bringing numbers to roughly 130,000, or the same as before the additional deployments began in early 2007.

PAUSE IN DRAWDOWNS?

Asked if he expected to discuss the idea of a pause in drawdowns with Petraeus, Gates said: "I think our conversation will cover the whole range of possibilities."

Petraeus said in a CNN interview late last month he would need some time to "let things settle a bit" after the initial drawdown, prompting speculation he wanted to keep about 130,000 troops or more in Iraq well into the second half of the year.

Gates, who arrived in Baghdad after attending a security conference in Germany, has said he hoped drawdowns could continue at the same pace in the second half of the year.

The defense secretary said he would also congratulate Iraq's leaders on progress towards political reconciliation, such as passing a law that will allow former members of Saddam Hussein's Baath party to regain their jobs in the government and military.

"They seem to have become energized in the last few weeks," Gates said.

Sunday's bombing occurred in a region where U.S. and Iraqi forces have launched a series of offensives aimed at Sunni Islamist al Qaeda, blamed for most large-scale attacks in Iraq.

Al Qaeda fighters have regrouped in northern provinces after being driven out of former strongholds in western Anbar and from around Baghdad during the major security crackdown last year.

The bombing came as the U.S. military said impatience with slow improvements to basic services like electricity and water could reverse recent security gains.

"What's necessary to come behind security are essential services ... part of that is through the central government's distribution of funds into the provinces," U.S. military spokesman Rear Admiral Greg Smith told a news conference.

"There will clearly be impatience with the level of support when you consider just how far many of these areas need to come in terms of employment and so forth," he said when asked if disaffected Sunni Arabs policing their own neighborhoods could become militias.

Millions of Baghdad residents still receive only fitful supplies of water and electricity.

(Additional reporting by Paul Tait, Tim Cocks and Aws Qusay in Baghdad; Writing by Dean Yates, editing by Sean Maguire)