Sept. 25 (Bloomberg) -- At least 26 Iraqis were killed and 50 wounded in a suicide attack that targeted a reconciliation meeting of officials near the northeastern city of Baquba.
A bomber set off an explosive belt in the attack in the village of Shifta late yesterday, state television said, citing a spokesman for Iraq's Interior Ministry, Abdel Karim Khalaf.
The bomber targeted administration and security officials of the local assembly. Among the dead was the head of a Shiite delegation, Sheikh Ahmed al-Tamimi and Ali Daleen al-Jourani, a local police chief.
An Iraqi security official said the meeting was between the Shiite Mahdi Army militia and the Sunni insurgent group, the Brigades of the 1920 Revolution, Agence France-Presse reported.
The attack has shattered the relative calm that has prevailed since the start of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan on Sept. 13. Attacks across Iraq have fallen to their lowest level since a February 2006 bombing of a Shiite Muslim shrine in Samarra sparked a wave of sectarian bloodshed, Lieutenant-General Ray Odierno, the number two U.S. commander in Iraq, said on Sept. 20.
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