Four bombs kill 16 in Iraq
Attacks across Iraq, including a series of bombings targeting shoppers in a Sunni neighbourhood in the capital Baghdad, have killed at least 16 people today.
In the neighbourhood of Dora, police said two bombs exploded on busy commercial streets this morning killing four people. Later, three more bomb blasts in the same area killed five people and wounded 10.
Outside of Baghdad, police said a suicide bomber killed five soldiers and wounded eight at a checkpoint in Mishada, some 20 miles north of the capital. Also today, a roadside bomb killed two soldiers on patrol and wounded five people in Tarmiyah, 30 miles north of Baghdad.
Health officials confirmed the casualty figures.
The attacks come as Iraq heads towards a crucial parliamentary election on April 30, its first since the 2011 US troop pull-out.
More than 9,000 candidates will vie for 328 seats in parliament, but there will be no balloting in parts of the Sunni-dominated Anbar province, which is engulfed in clashes between security forces and al-Qaida-inspired militants.
The militants have seized and are continuing to hold parts of the provincial capital, Ramadi, and nearly all of the nearby city of Fallujah.
