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Iraq bombings kill 33
AFP.
BAQUBA.
Three suicide attacks, including one by a bomber who rode in an ambulance to hospital before blowing himself up, killed 33 people in central Iraq yesterday, just days before nationwide elections.
The blasts in Baquba, the deadliest to hit the country in nearly a month, also wounded 55 people and spurred security forces to clamp an immediate curfew on the city, 60 kilometers north of Baghdad.
At least 10 policemen were among the 33 dead, a security official said.
The attacks came despite heightened security across Iraq ahead of Sunday’s vote and after the leader of Al-Qaeda in Iraq Abu Omar al-Baghdadi, threatened to disrupt the election by "military means".
Two near-simultaneous suicide vehicle bombs ripped through the provincial housing department’s offices and a nearby traffic intersection at around 9:30 am, the security official from Baquba operations command said. A bomber in police uniform then rode with wounded victims in an ambulance to the hospital where he blew himself up, according to Major Ghaleb al-Juburi, Baquba police spokesman.
"The suicide bomber tried to blow himself up against the police chief when he came to see the wounded in the hospital," said the security official. — AFP. |
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