Baghdad - Iraq was rocked on Monday by a fresh outbreak of
violence across the country, including a suicide bombing carried out
by a woman and a deadly attack on a Sunni politician.
In the attack by a female suicide bomber in the restive Diyala
province, at least two people were killed and 14 injured in a popular
market.
Wearing a suicide belt, the bomber hit the market in the Mafraq
area of central Baquba, 57 kilometres north-east of Baghdad, a local
security official told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.
The fatalities include a woman and a man as well as the bomber,
and a number of children and women were among the wounded, said the
official, who spoke on condition of anonymity.
It was the 17th suicide bombing carried out by a woman in Diyala
this year, according to figures released by the head of the local
council, Ibrahim Bajlan.
The last suicide attack carried out by a woman in Diyala hit a
centre belonging to the tribal police force fighting al-Qaeda
insurgents north-east of Baquba on June 26.
Three tribal volunteers were injured in the attack.
Diyala, known for its palm groves and orange orchards, became the
stronghold of the Sunni extremist al-Qaeda in Iraq group, who find a
safe haven in the province's groves and farms.
The group, which is most associated with suicide bombings and
beheadings, has been recruiting widows and destitute women to carry
out suicide attacks as women are not normally subjected to body
searches.
In the western Anbar province, a suicide bomber hit a checkpoint
manned by members of a tribal police force, injuring nine, according
to security sources.
The assailant driving a car bomb hit the security checkpoint
manned by tribal volunteers from the so-called Awakening Councils in
al-Simsimiya near the town of Rawa, security sources told the Voices
of Iraq VOI news agency.
Tribal chiefs in Anbar formed their own police squads with US
backing to fight Sunni militants from the Islamic State of Iraq
group, who were enforcing a strict version of the Islamic Sharia law
in the province.
Other Sunni-dominated provinces formed their own councils to fight
the militant group, also known as al-Qaeda in Iraq.
In the northern province in Nineveh, gunmen killed a member of the
Iraqi Islamic Party, Mohamed Abdul Barry Sharzi, security sources
told VOI.
The gunmen shot Sharzi dead in his house in al-Homa village in
Talafar, some 400 kilometers north of Baghdad.
The Iraqi Islamic Party is a Sunni group led by Vice-President
Tariq al-Hashimi.
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