A huge explosion hit Baghdad in the area of the Information Ministry early Saturday morning, just hours after Iraqis blamed a U.S. missile for a marketplace bombing that killed at least 50 civilians.

CTV.ca News Staff

A huge explosion hit Baghdad in the area of the Information Ministry early Saturday morning, just hours after Iraqis blamed a U.S. missile for a marketplace bombing that killed at least 50 civilians.

The blast occurred at about 1 a.m. Baghdad time, just as the city's mosques began broadcasting the call to prayer over the loudspeakers.

During the day, coalition forces dropped two 4,700-pound, satellite-guided "bunker-busting" bombs aimed at disrupting communications between Iraqi President Saddam Hussein's leadership and military.

Al-Jazeera reported that bombardments of the ruling Baath Party headquarters on Friday afternoon killed eight people.

Blasts were also heard on the southern outskirts late Friday, in areas where U.S.-led forces have been targeting Iraqi forces defending Baghdad against a U.S. invasion. The city of Mosul was also hit late Friday.

The latest air raids come just hours after a blast at a marketplace in Baghdad's Shula neighbourhood killed. Iraqi officials are blaming a U.S. missile, while Central Command says it is checking into the incident.

Mideast war?

In the U.S., Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld raised the spectre of a possible Mideast war. He said Friday shipments of military gear have been crossing from Syria into Iraq and warned the U.S. considered such shipments a "hostile act."

"We have information that shipments of military supplies have been crossing the border from Syria into Iraq, including night-vision goggles," Rumsfeld told a Washington press conference.

"These deliveries pose a direct threat to the lives of coalition forces. We consider such trafficking a hostile act and will hold the Syrian government accountable for such shipments," he added.

Syria rejected such accusations, saying Washington is trying to divert attention from civilian casualties in the war. "What Donald Rumsfeld said about the transportation of equipment from Syria to Iraq is an attempt to cover up what his forces have been committing against civilians in Iraq," a statement from the Syrian foreign ministry said.

Rumsfeld also warned Iran against inserting any of its forces in Iraq, saying they would be treated as hostile.

Military developments:

• A missile fell into the sea and rocked a major shopping mall in Kuwait City. Officials said the missile caused no injuries and little damage.
• The British military says Iraqi forces shot at about 2,000 civilians trying to flee fighting and a humanitarian crisis in Basra.
• Britain is investigating reports of a "friendly fire" incident involving British troops in Iraq. U.K. reports say one British soldier was killed after coming under attack by U.S. aircraft Friday afternoon.
• U.S.-led warplanes bomb Iraqi forces in Kurdish-controlled northern Iraq.
  
  Gen. Michael Jackson, Chief of British General Staff, says a a conventional fight with Saddam Hussein's Republican Guard is "not too far away."
• Kurdish fighters crossed the Iraqi frontline near Chamchamal for the first time. They say Iraqi troops appear to have retreated southwards towards Kirkuk.
• A British ship carrying humanitarian aid arrived at the port in Umm Qasr Friday following a successful mine-clearing operation.
• Military sources say U.S. troops using tanks and artillery battled about 1,500 Iraqi troops early Friday morning near Najaf.

Marketplace hit by blast

Images of weeping men and women were broadcast on Arabic television stations on Friday, following a blast in a marketplace in western Baghdad.

Al-Jazeera showed pictures of bodies, including at least two children, as well as people carrying coffins out of the hospital in Baghdad's Shula neighbourhood. One boy had a blood-soaked bandage on his nose and cried softly.

The death toll is still unclear. Al-Jazeera television said 55 had died, while Al-Arabiya said at least 52 people had been killed. Iraqi Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf said 58 people had been killed.

Arabic language television stations also reported that the damage was due to a U.S missile.

U.S. officials at the Central Command headquarters in Qatar told the British Broadcasting Corporation they had no details yet and suggested it may have been a misfired Iraqi missile.

On Wednesday, a blast at a market in the Shaab area of Baghdad killed at least 15 people and injured 30 others. Iraqi officials blamed a U.S. missile in that case.

Pentagon officials downplayed such suggestions, saying it could have just as easily been a surface-to-air missile that missed its target and fell back into the area.

British forces battle for Basra

A British commander said Friday that British forces are "nowhere near" capturing the key city of Basra in southern Iraq.

British military spokesman Col. Chris Vernon told Sky News television that there was no way to get humanitarian aid into Basra, which was "clearly nowhere near yet in our hands."

"But as we begin to pressurize Basra and begin to dominate it militarily, it is fixed in military terms," Vernon said from southern Iraq. "Nothing can move in or out militarily. We should move toward a day when we can get humanitarian aid into Basra."

British troops have been engaged in some of the fiercest fighting in the war in Basra, where aid agencies say residents are without food or water due to the invasion. There are 1.3 million people living in the city.

Also Friday, Iraqi paramilitary forces attacked about 2,000 civilians trying to flee the city of Basra, according to a British military spokesman.

Lt.-Col. Ronnie McCourt said the civilians were hit with mortar and machine gun fire as they made their way out of the city of 1.3 million.

Capt. Robert Sandford, with the 7th Armoured Brigade, said groups of Iraqi militia landed eight or nine mortars near the civilians.

Vernon said the latest incident suggested that the Iraqi people were "trying to break free" from the Baath party regime. "And clearly the militia don't want that. They want to keep their population in there, and they fired on them to force them back in," he told Sky News.

It is not clear whether any civilians or Iraqi paramilitaries were killed.

Battle in Nasiriyah

In the southern city of Nasiriyah, U.S. Marines and Iraqi forces exchanged tank and artillery fire Friday as other allied forces pushed north of the strategic city toward Baghdad in a grinding movement of weapons and supplies.

While U.S. forces reportedly made inroads into Nasiriyah, occupying parts of the city, there were reports up to 12 U.S. Marines were missing in the fighting.

Ground forces called in air strikes from Cobra helicopters on the many Iraqi units believed scattered around the area. Incoming and outgoing shelling rocked the city Friday, covering it in a pall of thick black smoke.

Allied aircraft also destroyed two Iraqi paramilitary headquarters, according to U.S. Central Command.

U.S. troops fighting in Nasiriyah have reportedly been embroiled in urban combat by Iraqi paramilitaries said to be wearing civilian clothing.

"The militia are fighting pretty good in the town," Marine Capt. Lauren Edwards told Reuters. "It's a big surprise. I don't think we expected so much resistance. They're fighting hard and they're fighting dirty."

Nasiriyah, located on the Euphrates River near a junction of roads that lead from Kuwait to Baghdad, has been the scene of some of the fiercest fighting of the war, prompting marines to call the southern entrances to the city "Ambush Alley."

Earlier this week, more than 25 marines were wounded in fighting at Nasiriya. U.S. officials said some or all of them were hurt when one marine unit mistakenly fired on another.

Other developments:

• The United Nations Security Council has unanimously voted to resume the Iraq oil-for-food program suspended shortly after the U.S.-led invasion.
• U.S. President George Bush, addressing U.S. war veterans Friday, said that he will not accept anything less than complete victory and demanded "further sacrifice" from troops in Iraq.
• U.S. official said Bush has "some level of frustration with the press corps" for reports calling the war plan for Iraq into question.
• British Prime Minister Tony Blair told BBC radio on Friday it would be "tough and difficult" to remove Hussein from power.
• A U.S. military commander denied that allied war planners had underestimated Iraqi forces. Brig.-Gen. Vincent Brooks told a press briefing Friday that while the dynamics of battle change on a daily basis, the allies have a "good grip" on the situation.
• The U.S. State Department said on Friday it had information Iraqi intelligence officers had been planning terrorist attacks in two foreign countries. Those operatives have been arrested, spokesman Richard Boucher said.
• Chief UN weapons inspector Hans Blix will retire in June. Blix oversaw weapons inspections in Iraq before the U.S.-led invasion.
• Russia says this is the most serious conflict since the Cold War, and warned it threatens global stability and international law.
• The war death toll includes: 27 U.S. forces, 20 British forces and 504 Iraqi civilians (Iraqi estimates).

With reports from The Associated Press