BAGHDAD: At least nine people were killed in Baghdad late on Monday in a car bomb attack claimed by Daesh (Islamic State) near a hospital in a central district, police and hospital sources said.
A suicide bomber had targeted a gathering in the Karrada district, according to a statement circulated online by the Amaq news agency, which supports the ultra-hardline militant group.
The police and hospital sources said 20 people were also wounded in the blast and they expected the death toll to rise.
The fight against Daesh, which seized a third of Iraq’s territory in 2014, has exacerbated a long-running sectarian conflict in Iraq.
The militants have lost ground in the past year to U.S.-backed government forces and Iranian-backed militias, but such bombings show they can still strike outside the territory they control in northern and western Iraq.
Monday’s blast occurred not far from the site of a Daesh suicide attack in July that killed 324 people in one of the deadliest bombings of its sort in Iraq since U.S.-led forces toppled Saddam Hussein 13 years ago.
Source : Reuters
