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Baghdad, Iraq, Another Bombing

Baghdad bomber, 10 Iraqis dead, violence rises

The target was a bus of Iraq's oil ministry employees passing a police academy. Alongside the 10 deaths, 30 more people were wounded.

The October 15 referendum, about Iraq's constitution, is probably the cause for the bombing.

A survivor commented: "We heard the blast. They died." It is still unclear whether the target was the bus with state employees or the police academy cadets.

Oil Minister Ibrahim Bahr al-Uloum believes the bomber had aimed the attack at his staff.

"Unfortunately these terrorist operations continue to target innocents."

The ethnic and sectarian killings have led to fears that Iraq's fragmented communities are heading to civil war.

Former Iraqi Prime Minister Iyad Allawi warned that the Ibrahim Jaafari Government fails to stabilize the situation between the ethnic and religious communities.

"National consensus is being eroded grossly. The government should

Really reverse course, embark on national reconciliation, and reinstitute institutions without militias ... this is the only way forward."

"We see an extensive program of dismantling state institutions ... These are ingredients for catastrophe."

The International Crisis Group is of the same opinion:

"The constitution is likely to fuel rather than dampen insurgency."

"A compact based on compromise and broad consent could have been a

First step in a healing process. Instead it is proving yet another step in a process of depressing decline." (Robert Malley, head of the think-tank's Middle East and North Africa program)