BAGHDAD: A series of bombings targeting Shia pilgrims, including by a suicide attacker disguised as a woman, killed 16 people in Baghdad yesterday despite heavy security across the capital.
The blasts are the latest in a protracted surge of nationwide bloodshed that has left more than 3,600 people dead this year, fuelling fears Iraq is slipping back into the brutal communal bloodshed that blighted the country in 2006 and 2007.
Three blasts — two suicide bombings and a vehicle rigged with explosives — targeted pilgrims who were preparing for commemorations for a revered figure in Shia Islam.
In the deadliest attack, a militant dressed in a black full-length woman’s robe, or abaya, blew himself up amid a group of Shia worshippers in the west Baghdad neighbourhood of Mansur. The explosion killed at least eight people and wounded 26.
Another suicide attacker detonated a car bomb in Baab Al Sharji, central Baghdad, killing three more, while a vehicle rigged with explosives in the northern neighbourhood of Urr left five dead.
AFP
