Meanwhile, back in Frostbite Falls

Bombings, shootings kill 61 in Iraq

By Ahmed Rasheed and Aseel Kami

Bombings and shootings killed up to 61 people in Iraq on Tuesday, including at least 26 soldiers, undermining the government's attempts to show it can suppress unremitting violence.

A roadside bomb attack on a bus filled with Iraqi troops on a road between Tikrit and Baiji, north of Baghdad, killed at least 23, the army said. In the northwestern town of Tal Afar, a car bomb killed three more Iraqi soldiers and wounded four, police said.

A British soldier was killed in a mortar attack on an army base in the southern city of Basra, a British military spokesman said. In Baghdad, a suicide bomber in a car targeted soldiers collecting their salaries from a bank, killing at least 10 people, including an elderly woman, police said. State television put the toll at 14.