HILLA, Iraq: A powerful car bombing in the town of Hilla, 100 km (62 miles) south of Baghdad, on Monday left at least 130 people martyred and more than 170 wounded with toll rising.

It was the single bloodiest attack in Iraq since the fall of tyrant Saddam.
The bomber blew the car up next to a line of police and National Guard recruits waiting at a health center to take an eye test so they could join the Iraqi police in Hilla.

Torn limbs and other body parts littered the street outside the clinic.

Monday's blast outside the clinic was so powerful it nearly vaporized the suicide bomber's car, leaving only its engine partially intact. The injured were piled into pickup trucks, ambulances and wooden carts and taken to nearby hospitals.

Outside the concrete and brick building in Hilla, people gingerly walked around small lakes of blood pooling on the street. Scorch marks infused with blood covered the clinic's walls and dozens of people helped pile body parts, including arms, feet and limbs, into blankets.

Babil province police headquarters said "several people" were arrested in connection with the blast.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair has led international condemnation of what he termed the "callous" bombing.

German Foreign Minister Joschka Fischer said the perpetrators wanted to sabotage the country's reconstruction.

The White House condemned "in the strongest possible terms" the suicide bombing.
Spokesman Scott McClellan said: “We condemn this attack in the strongest possible terms. This is an attack on innocent Iraqi civilians… The terrorists who carry out these attacks are the enemies of the Iraqi people and the enemies of their aspirations for a free and peaceful future.”

“We continue to work closely with Iraqi security forces to bring to justice the terrorists and former regime elements who seek to derail the transition to democracy. They will be defeated. The Iraqi people have shown through their courage and determination that they want to live in freedom and we stand with the Iraqi people as they seek to build a free and peaceful future,” the spokesman added.

In Pakistan, Chief of Tehreik Nafaz-e Fiqh-e-Jafariya (TNFJ) Sayyed Hamid Moosavi strongly condemned the attack.

In Brussels, High Representative of the European Union for the Common Foreign and Security Policy Javier Solana severely denounced the Hilla bombing.

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan slammed the attack and said the main objective of constant violence by Bathists that target Iraqis is to create hurdles in democracy and prosperity in Iraq. He urged all sides to work jointly for national interests.

Canadian Foreign Affairs Minister Pierre Pettigrew "strongly" condemned the suicide bombing in Hilla, branding it an attempt to provoke sectarian strife.

The bombing came one day after Iraqi officials announced that Syria had captured and handed over Saddam's half brother. The arrest of Sabawi Ibrahim Al-Hassan ended months of Syrian denials it was harboring fugitives from the ousted Saddam regime. Iraq authorities said Damascus acted in a gesture of goodwill. Sabawi, who shared a mother with Saddam, was arrested along with 29 other fugitive members of the former dictator's Baath Party in Hasakah in northeastern Syria.