* Coordinated attacks strike Baghdad, other cities
* Officials see attempt to scuttle Arab League summit
* Violence raises fears of return to sectarian strife
(Adds details on summit, al Qaeda)
BAGHDAD, Feb 23 (Reuters) - Simultaneous early morning
attacks on mostly Shi'ite targets across Iraq killed at least 60
people and wounded dozens on Thursday in one of the bloodiest
days of violence since U.S. troops pulled out in mid-December.
The attacks that appeared to pitch al Qaeda-linked Sunni
Muslim insurgents against Shi'ites raised fears of a return to
the widespread sectarian carnage that tore Iraq apart and cost
thousands of lives in 2006 and 2007.
The violence breaks weeks of relative calm as Shi'ite Prime
Minister Nuri al-Maliki and Sunni leaders have sought to resolve
a political crisis that threatened to unravel their
power-sharing agreement following the U.S. withdrawal.
At least 32 people were killed in blasts in Baghdad where 10
explosions tore through mainly Shi'ite neighbourhoods during
rush hour and other attacks targeted police patrols, commuters
and crowds gathered in shopping areas.
"We were sitting at a restaurant having soup for breakfast
when the bomb exploded. I lost consciousness and then saw smoke
and dust when I came to. I saw people and body parts
everywhere," police officer Ahmed Kadhim told Reuters.
Kadhim suffered shrapnel wounds to his left leg and back
when a car bomb exploded near a restaurant killing six people
and wounding 18 in Baghdad's northern Kadhimiya district.
The interior ministry blamed al Qaeda and affiliated armed
groups for the attacks it said were an attempt to show that
Iraq's security situation remained unstable.
The blasts hit just weeks before Baghdad plans to host an
Arab League summit, which has been postponed because of regional
turmoil and acrimony between Iraq's Shi'ite-led government and
some Sunni Gulf states.
Holding a successful summit at the end of March would help
Iraq restore its place in the Arab World since the U.S.
withdrawal and help allay Sunni Gulf States worries over Iran's
influence over Iraq's Shi'ite government.
"The attacks aimed to spark sectarian strife among the Iraqi
people, and to prevent the Arab League meeting from being held,"
Parliament Speaker Osama al-Nujaifi said.
DOZENS OF BLASTS
More than a dozen blasts and attacks hit other cities across
Iraq from Mosul in the north to Hilla, south of Baghdad, many of
them targeting police.
The violence was aimed at Shi'ite neighbourhoods but also
against security forces, a frequent target of Sunni insurgents.
Iraqi officials had predicted such groups would try to stir
sectarian tensions with attacks after American forces went home.
While violence has ebbed since the height of the war, Sunni
insurgents affiliated to al Qaeda are still capable of
large-scale assaults. Some rival Shi'ite militias have said they
will cease fighting since the U.S. withdrawal.
Islamic State of Iraq, an umbrella group for al Qaeda-linked
insurgents in Iraq, has claimed responsibility for recent large
attacks on the capital, including a Dec. 22 wave of bombings
that killed at least 71 people.
In Thursday's violence, one car bomb in the capital killed
at least nine people and wounded 27 in the upmarket Karrada
neighbourhood, hurling shrapnel into the next street and blowing
out glass from nearby buildings.
Witnesses saw at four wrecked cars full of shrapnel and
bloodied seats near an ice-cream shop at the site of another
blast.
In at least three Shi'ite neighbourhoods in Baghdad, nine
policemen were killed, and in the capital's northwestern
Kadhimiya district, a car bomb killed six people when it struck
a street lined with restaurants.
In the biggest attack outside the capital, a car bomb killed
seven people and wounded 33 in the town of Balad, north of
Baghdad.
Iraq's political crisis erupted after Maliki moved against
two senior members of the Sunni-backed Iraqiya political bloc
shortly after the U.S. troop withdrawal in December, prompting a
walkout by Iraqiya lawmakers that lasted until late January.
Tensions eased as Sunni, Shi'ite and Kurdish blocs tried to
negotiate an end to the crisis. But a week ago a panel of judges
detailed 150 attacks they said were carried out by death squads
under Sunni Vice President Tareq al-Hashemi's command. Maliki
sought Hashemi's arrest in December.
Hashemi, who has taken refuge in the autonomous region of
Kurdistan, has denied accusations made against him, dismissing
them as part of a plot to destroy Maliki's opponents.
The crisis was followed by a wave of attacks in December and
January on Shi'ite neighbourhoods, including a suicide bombing
on a Shi'ite funeral procession that killed 31 in Baghdad and an
attack on Shi'ite pilgrims that left 53 dead in Basra.
Violence had ebbed until Sunday when a suicide car bomber
killed 19 people in an attack on a Baghdad police academy.
(Writing by Yara Bayoumy and Francois Murphy; Editing by
Patrick Markey and Giles Elgood)
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