Reuters reports that a third bomb exploded in Baghdad on Tuesday, killing at least 19 people and wounding 15 others.
Advertisement
At press time, local media reported that another explosion had occurred in Baghdad’s Sadr City neighbourhood, where a auto bomb killed over 60 people last week at a bustling market.
The Islamic State group has claimed responsibility for a back-to-back twin bombing earlier in the day at an outdoor market in a Shiite-dominated neighborhood of Baghdad that left at least 28 dead.
Tuesday’s bombings were just the latest in a wave of attacks in Baghdad and surrounding areas that has left more than 200 dead over the past week.
At least 72 people were killed and more than 140 wounded by three bombings in Baghdad today, police and medical sources said, extending the deadliest spate of attacks in the Iraqi capital so far this year.
Militiamen loyal to firebrand Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr sealed off the district after the attack and mounted a guard for government buildings, locals said.
Security in Baghdad has improved over the last years, but deadly attacks against security forces and civilians are still a regular occurrence.
The four separate bombings were a further challenge to the beleaguered government of Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi, who is struggling to prove that his forces can maintain security in Baghdad and elsewhere.
Sunday’s spectacular attack in the town of Taji, about 20 kilometres (12 miles) north of Baghdad, saw a suicide auto bombing at the facility’s main gate, followed by several IS fighters breaking into the plant where they clashed with security forces for hours before the attackers were repelled. Iraqi security forces have made progress on several battlefield fronts against IS in recent months, including capturing Ramadi, the provincial capital of Iraq’s Anbar province. The top of one of the gas-processing units was blown off.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks, which bore the hallmarks of the extremist Islamic State group that has been behind recent deadly attacks in the Iraqi capital and beyond. Iraqi state TV showed workers in navy blue overalls filling metal and plastic cylinders on conveyor belts and forklift trucks loading cylinders into trucks. In 2014, the IS declared an Islamic caliphate on the territory it holds in Iraq and Syria and at the height of its power was estimated to hold almost a third of both Iraq and Syria.
Al-Shaab, Dora and Sadr City are all are predominantly Shiite Muslim.
The attacks come as Iraq is locked in a political crisis, with parliament resisting attempts to alter the cabinet as part of an anti-corruption drive.
Advertisement
On Friday, ISIS gunmen opened fire on a coffee shop in Balad, a city about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Baghdad. There were multiple fatalities and more than a dozen injuries, the AP reports.
