Shootings and bombings in Iraq killed at least 15 people Thursday, officials said, as the country struggles with rampant violence ahead of parliamentary elections at the end of the month.

Shootings and bombings in Iraq killed at least 15 people Thursday, officials said, as the country struggles with rampant violence ahead of parliamentary elections at the end of the month.

In Thursday's deadliest single incident, gunmen opened fire on a group of young Shiite men in Khales, north of Baghdad, and killed five of them, a police colonel and a doctor said.

In a market in Baquba, also north of the capital, a gunman shot dead an army captain, while a roadside bomb killed a woman near the city.

In Baghdad itself, a car bomb exploded near a bakery in the Sadr City area, killing at least four people and wounding 18, officials said.

Another car bomb near a petrol station in the Ameen area of east Baghdad killed at least three people and wounded 12.

The attacks came after eight car bombs hit the capital the day before.

In a bid to cause maximum casualties, militants frequently target areas where crowds gather, such as shops, markets, mosques and cafes.

And in the northern province of Kirkuk, a member of powerful terrorist group the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant killed his father, apparently because he refused to leave a rival militant group, security sources said.