At least 32 people were killed and 61 wounded by a car bomb in a busy square in Baghdad’s sprawling Sadr City district on Monday.
Many of the victims were daily labourers waiting for jobs at an intersection in Sadr City, a sprawling majority Shiite neighbourhood in the northeast of the capital that has been repeatedly targeted.
This was the second major attack in Baghdad in three days.
At least 27 people were killed by twin explosions in a busy market area in central Baghdad on Saturday, in what was the deadliest such attack in the Iraqi capital in two months.
There was no immediate claim for today’s suicide blast but the Islamic State jihadist group has claimed all such attacks recently, including the double bombing on New Year’s Eve.
The caliphate IS proclaimed in 2014 is shrinking steadily and jihadist fighters are defending Mosul, their last major urban stronghold in Iraq. Observers have voiced fears that the group, once it definitively loses its status as a land-holding force, could increasingly revert to targeting civilians in Iraq’s cities.
(All pictures sourced from AFP)