Two car bombs killed four people in the Iraqi capital on Sunday. A large car bomb exploded in western Baghdad, apparently targeting a US patrol but killing an Iraqi bystander, as a curfew of the capital came to a noisy end, officials said. The were no reports of US casualties but the blast left a building in flames, destroyed several cars and also wounded four people in BaghdadÂ’s leafy residential neighbourhood of Jamaa, an Iraqi security official said. The explosion came after a period of relative calm due to a citywide curfew between Friday night and Sunday morning, which took cars and pedestrians off the streets and gave Baghdad one of its quietest days in months. The curfew, which ended at 6:00 am, was imposed due to reports of a plot to attack the heavily fortified Green Zone, the seat of the Iraqi government, with a wave of suicide car bombers.
Three people were killed and eight wounded in central Baghdad when a car exploded in the early afternoon. Security officials said US and Iraqi forces took advantage of the curfew to mount several operations around Baghdad. Residents of Sadr City reported a joint US-Iraqi military operation early on Sunday. The US military said only that “specially trained Iraqi army forces conducted an early morning raid today to capture a suspected terrorist involved in the kidnapping and murder of Iraqi civilians in northeast Baghdad”.