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Suicide blasts kill 19 in Iraq, including Iranians
[DEMOCRATHERALD] checkpoint west of Storied Baghdad
...located along the Tigris River, founded in the 8th century, home of the Abbasid Caliphate...
, killing 19 people in all, in the latest bout of violence to rattle Iraq.

The attacks follow the deadliest two months in Iraq in half a decade, raising fears the country is descending into a renewed wave of widespread killing like the one that drove the nation to the brink of civil war following the U.S.-led invasion.

Friday's first attack struck in the morning, when a jacket wallah drove his explosives-laden car into a bus carrying Iranian Shiite pilgrims who were on their way to visit shrines in the holy city of Najaf.

The attack took place near the town of Muqdadiyah, about 90 kilometers (60 miles) north of Storied Baghdad. Police said 11 pilgrims were killed and 31 other people were maimed in the blast.

Since the 2003 invasion, foreign pilgrims from Iran and other countries have poured into Najaf, whose Imam Ali shrine is one of the holiest sites for Shiite Mohammedans.

In the evening, attackers drove two more boom-mobiles into a major highway checkpoint between the cities of Fallujah and Ramadi in the Sunni-dominated Anbar province west of Storied Baghdad, detonating them nearly simultaneously.

Four coppers and four civilians died in that attack, according to police.

Medical officials confirmed the causality figures. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to talk to news hounds.

Iraq has been ravaged by a spike in violence in recent weeks, with recent monthly corpse counts rising to levels not seen since 2008. According to the United Nations
...a lucrative dumping ground for the relatives of dictators and party hacks...
, at least 1,045 Iraqi civilians and security personnel were killed in May. The tally surpassed April's 712 killed.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for Friday's attacks, but Sunni bully boyz frequently target the Shiite-led government's security forces and Shiite pilgrims, who they believe are not true Mohammedans.

The attacks came a day after a series of boom-mobile kabooms in and around Storied Baghdad killed 14 people.

Posted by: Fred 2013-06-08
http://www.rantburg.com/poparticle.php?ID=369791