String of explosions kill at least 13 people and wound 74 in Baghdad area

A string of explosions killed at least 13 people and wounded 74 in the Baghdad area on Sunday, including a suicide bombing targeting Iraqi soldiers north of the capital.
A total of 11 roadside bombs, two vehicles packed with explosives and one suicide attacker struck in the spate of morning blasts on Sunday, although it was not immediately clear to what extent, if any, the violence was coordinated.

The deadliest attack saw seven policemen killed and 10 others wounded in a suicide bombing in the town of Taji, 25 kilometers (15 miles) north of the capital. A car bomb had initially gone off in the town, and when residents and ambulance crews arrived at the scene, the suicide bomber blew himself up.

Four roadside bombs and a car bomb near a police station in the south Baghdad neighborhood of Al-Amil killed two people and wounded 15, including three policemen, while a roadside bomb in Saidiyah, also in the south, wounded three people.

Two separate roadside bombs, one near a hospital and another near a popular market, in the north Baghdad district of Sadr City left two other people dead and 14 wounded.

Also in north Baghdad, a roadside bomb targeting a police brigadier general's convoy killed a civilian and wounded five people, including two of the senior commander's bodyguards.

Meanwhile, two roadside bombs in central Al-Wathiq square killed one person and wounded 12, six of them policemen, while a bomb blast in eastern Beirut Square wounded six.

Sunday's violence comes a day after seven people were killed in attacks in the disputed northern province of Kirkuk, further raising tension in the oil-producing region. It also comes just days after blasts against police in a tense northern city killed 29 people, with just months to go before all US occupation forces must withdraw from Iraq.