At least 30 people were killed in violence across Iraq on Monday. A bomb exploded during prayers at a Shia mosque in Baghdad, killing at least eight worshippers, police said. Police initially blamed the attack on a suicide bomber trying to enter the building but later said the blast was caused by a bomb placed in the corner behind the preacherÂ’s podium. Three car bombs and two roadside devices killed 18 people in Kirkuk on Monday, police said. The blasts happened in different parts of the city but exploded within a few minutes. One car bomb targeted the local offices of the secular political party of former prime minister Iyad Allawi, another one targeted a government building and the third exploded in a commercial street, Brigadier Sarhat Qader said. The three roadside bombs targeted Iraqi police and army patrols, Qader said.
Gunmen killed three civilians in broad daylight in Hilla, south of Baghdad, a police officer said. Police in Hilla also found large caches of weapons, including 500 mortar rounds and artillery shells.
The mayor of a small Shia village south of Baghdad was kidnapped on his way to work on Monday, and his bullet-riddled body was later found dumped along a highway, police and morgue officials said. Police said Khalaf Ghargan, the mayor of Dijelah, was abducted by gunmen about 300 metres from his home. GharganÂ’s body was later found dumped on a highway and brought to the Kut morgue. A roadside bomb exploded on Monday near a police patrol in Mosul, wounding two civilians, police said.
Separately, nine alleged insurgents, including a roadside bomb maker, were detained on Monday in raids in Baghdad and Ramadi, the US military said. A man accused of making roadside bombs aimed at US-led forces and two other suspects were captured in Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, while four others were detained in Fallujah, 50 kilometres to the east, according to a statement. Two others accused of helping Al Qaeda in Iraq bring foreign fighters into Iraq were seized in eastern Baghdad, it said.
Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki insisted sectarian killing had come to an end in his country, blaming ongoing daily violence on Al Qaeda in a television interview on Monday.