BAGHDAD, Iraq — A mortar barrage followed minutes later by a car bomb blasted Baghdad's upscale Karradah district today, killing at least 31 people and wounding 153, police said.

The explosions occurred at midmorning in a religiously mixed neighborhood controlled by a major Shiite party, two days after President Bush approved plans to send more U.S. and Iraqi troops into the capital city to curb rising sectarian violence.

Several mortars landed in the district, some destroying a bank and an apartment building that later collapsed in flames, said Interior Ministry secretary Saadoun Abu al-Ula. The others exploded in the middle of busy streets crowded with traffic.

The car bomb exploded just blocks away near a gas station, shattering storefronts and spraying flaming gasoline onto homes and stores, the Interior Ministry said. Charred hulks of trucks overturned on the streets. The front of an apartment complex was shorn away.

The explosion occurred about 200 yards from the house of Vice President Adil Abdul-Mahdi, a Shiite and a senior figure in the Supreme Council of the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the country's biggest Shiite party.

BAGHDAD, Iraq — Lawyers gave closing arguments today for the last two defendants in Saddam Hussein's trial, and the chief judge adjourned the proceedings until mid-October when the ex-president and two top lieutenants could be sentenced to death.Saddam was not in court because his court-appointed attorney presented closing arguments Wednesday. The defense team has boycotted the trial since last month to protest the killing of lawyer Khamis al-Obeidi. He was the third defense lawyer slain since the trial began in October.The ousted president and seven others have been on trial since Oct. 19 for their alleged roles in the killing of Shiite Muslims in Dujail following an assassination attempt on Saddam there in 1982. The prosecution has asked for the death penalty for Saddam and two others.