BAGHDAD: A suicide bomber blew himself up in a crowd of police recruits Tuesday, killing at least 52 people and undercutting Iraqi security efforts as the nation struggles to show it can protect itself without foreign help. The death toll was still rising more than three hours after police said the bomber joined a crowd of more than 100 recruits and detonated his explosives-packed vest outside the police station in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit, 130 km north of Baghdad. The attack starkly displayed the Iraqi forces' failure to plug even the most obvious holes in their security as the US military prepares to withdraw from Iraq at the year's end. One recruit who survived the blast said the jobseekers were frisked before they entered the station's yard. “We were waiting in the line to enter the police station yard after being searched when a powerful explosion threw me to the ground,” said recruit Quteiba Muhsin, whose legs were fractured in the blast. Tikrit is the capital of Sunni-dominated Salahuddin province, and the city sheltered some of Al-Qaeda's most fervent support after the 2003 US-led invasion ousted Saddam.
