BAGHDAD – Two bombs killed at least 25 people at a checkpoint outside a provincial Iraqi governor’s house yesterday in the latest in a series of attacks against local government and security forces.
A suicide bomber blew himself up and a car bomb exploded almost simultaneously outside the Diwaniya governor’s house, 150km (95 miles) south of Baghdad, just as guards changed shifts. Most of the victims were security staff, officials said.
“I heard a loud blast and then another one. I opened the door and I saw white smoke and smelled the blood . . . I looked to the side and I saw three guards dead on the ground,” said Maha al-Sagban, a resident whose house was damaged.
Television footage showed the burnt-out wreckage of a truck lying by the remains of a guard post. Bloodied and wounded security guards filled the beds of a local Diwaniya hospital.
Muayad al-Ansary, a spokesman for the provincial council in Diwaniya, said the death toll had risen to 25 and 35 more were wounded.
Bombings and killings in Iraq have fallen sharply since the height of sectarian violence in 2006-2007, but a stubborn Sunni Islamist insurgency linked to al-Qaeda, other Sunni groups and rival Shia militias still carry out daily attacks.
Five people were killed and nine wounded in a separate attack yesterday in Mussayab, south of Baghdad, police said. – (Reuters)