Baquba, March 03: Three coordinated suicide attacks in the central Iraqi city of Baquba, killed at least 10 people and wounded 30 on Wednesday, just days before parliamentary elections, a security official said.
Two near-simultaneous suicide vehicle bombs hit the city’s provincial housing department’s offices and a nearby intersection at around 9:30 am (0630 GMT) while a third person later blew himself up at Baquba’s main hospital.
“The suicide bomber tried to blow himself up against the police chief when he came to see the wounded in the hospital,” the official at Baquba operations command said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
Police chief Major General Abdul Hussein al-Shimmari escaped unharmed but a number of his personal security team were wounded.
The first vehicle crashed through the entrance to the provincial housing department’s compound, which sits next to a police station, before exploding.
Moments later at a nearby traffic intersection, a suicide bomber triggered the explosives packed into his vehicle, creating a powerful blast. The hospital bombing occurred a short time later.
Baquba, about 60 kilometre (40 miles) north of Baghdad and capital of Diyala province, is one of Iraq’s disputed areas and was a hotbed of Sunni insurgents in the wake of the 2003 US-led invasion.
Iraqis go to the polls on March 7 in legislative elections, the second such vote since Saddam Hussein was ousted in a US-led invasion in 2003.
-Agencies