Five killed in Iraq bomb attacks

BAGHDAD - A rash of bomb attacks in Iraq, two targeting pilgrims headed to the holy city of Karbala for a Shiite religious festival, killed five people and wounded 18 on Thursday, security officials said.

In one of the attacks, a Shiite pilgrim was killed and seven others wounded by a roadside bomb in Baghdad's commercial district of Karrada as they set off towards Karbala, 110 kilometres (70 miles) south of Baghdad, the officials said.

Another explosion killed a policeman and injured five of his colleagues near a checkpoint in the Zafraniya district of southern Baghdad set up to search pilgrims heading south.

Tens of thousands of Shiites are expected to flock to Karbala to venerate Imam Mahdi, an eighth century imam who vanished as a boy and whom Shiites believe will return to bring justice to the world.

The Shiite community was once led by a series of infallible imams that were direct descendants of the Prophet Mohammed and his son-in-law Ali. When the Mahdi went into hiding, leadership of the community passed to the clergy.

In other violence, a car bomb targeting a police patrol near the restive city of Baquba, about 60 kilometres (35 miles) north of Baghdad, killed two policemen and injured six, security officials said.

The defence ministry said that on Tuesday the Iraqi army discovered dozens of houses which had been booby-trapped with explosives by Al-Qaeda jihadists in the same area – about 10 kilometres southeast of Baquba.

Also near Baquba, a bomb hidden in a field killed a 10-year-old girl, a security official said.

On July 29, some 50,000 Iraqi soldiers and police launched a major push against Al-Qaeda and other insurgents in Diyala, which commanders describe as Iraq's most dangerous province.

The Iraqi military imposed a curfew on Baquba, capital of Diyala, on Tuesday after a suicide bomber struck, injuring the governor of the province.