Double bomb attack kills 13 at busy Baghdad market
An Iraqi girl walks past the site of a roadside bomb in Baghdad’s Karrada district on June 13, 2012 as a wave of bombings and shootings rocked Iraq during a major Shiite religious commemoration, killing scores of people and wounding dozens more.
At least 13 people have been killed and more than 100 wounded in two bomb attacks on a busy market in the Iraqi capital, Baghdad.
The first bomb exploded as shoppers were buying groceries at the open-air al-Husseiniya market, an area on the outskirts of the city populated mainly by Shia Muslims. The second bomb went off minutes later as security forces rushed to the site, according to Reuters.
According to the Associated Press, four Iraqis were also killed in two other attacks on Friday. A car bomb exploded near the entrance of the Shi’ite al-Askari shrine in the city of Samarra, killing one person and injuring 13 others, while gunmen fired on a checkpoint in Baghdad’s western Bayaa district, killing three police officers.
More from GlobalPost: At least 15 killed in suicide attack on Shia funeral in Iraq
According to the BBC, more than 130 people have been killed this month since Sunni militant groups – including Al Qaeda’s local affiliate, the Islamic State of Iraq – launched a series of bombing attacks on Shia Muslims in a bid to undermine the government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki and trigger further sectarian fighting in the country.
Earlier this week at least 15 people were killed and dozens injured in a suicide attack on a Shia funeral in the central Iraqi city of Baquba, while last Wednesday 72 people died in a wave of nearly two dozen coordinated attacks on Shia pilgrims across the country.