Further north amidst heavy skirmishing a further seven people, including three policemen, were killed in clashes between gunmen and security forces in the northern city of Mosul, and two bombs killed four more in the town of Tal Afar.
In a continuation of last weeks targeting the Sunni governors of Anbar and Salahuddin provinces escaped assassination attempts unhurt on Thursday when their convoys were attacked with car bombs. The two men have been cooperating with Shi'ite Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki in an effort to defuse Sunni discontent. Attempts to ease the political crisis have been hampered by deep divisions among Sunni leaders. Hardliners and insurgents who oppose Maliki have sometimes attacked moderates, who favor negotiations and a more temperate approach.
Later in the week the ISF reportedly foiled an al Qaeda plot to use tanker trucks packed with explosives to attack a key Baghdad oil facility, a senior security official and a Ministry of Oil source reported. "We have arrested a key local leader of al Qaeda who organised the plan to launch a major attack against a large oil facility in Baghdad," a senior anti-terrorism official said. The ISF said insurgents planned to pack explosives into tankers transporting crude oil from southern Basra oilfields to the main oil storage depots inside the major oil facility of Baghdad, where the bombs would be detonated. "They were planning to put in explosives and booby-trap more than one oil tanker," he said.
The security official declined to name the facility because an investigation was underway, however oil ministry officials said the security forces were on high alert following a spate of attacks on a northern pipeline in the past weeks. Baghdad oil facilities include the large Doura refinery, East Baghdad oilfield, which currently has limited production of around 10,000 barrels per day to feed Doura, and a gas facility just north of the capital.
Militants more often target security forces, and Shi'ite and Sunni mosques, but attacks on major oil sites beyond pipeline bombings are more sporadic, however militants have over the last month repeatedly attacked a key pipeline from Iraq’s northern oilfields near Kirkuk, which transports oil to the Turkish port of Ceyhan. In addition, in April of this year gunmen also attacked a gas field operated by Korea Gas Company in the western desert, killing three local contractors.
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