41 killed in separate attacks across Iraq

Forty-one people were killed and some 129 others wounded in separate attacks, including a massive suicide bombing, in Iraq on Sunday, police and medical sources said. In one attack, at least 34 people were killed and over 120 others wounded during the morning rush hours when a suicide car bomber blew up his explosive-laden car at a police checkpoint at the entrance of an archeological site of the ancient Babylon, just north of the city of Hilla, some 100 km south of Baghdad, a local police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity. The huge blast set fire to more than 30 cars and damaged dozens of others, along with destroying the checkpoint buildings, the source said. An official from Hilla hospital told Xinhua that his hospital " has received 34 bodies and more than 120 wounded people were admitted for treatment." Five policemen were among the killed and many others were among the wounded, in addition to many women and children, the source said. "Some of the bodies were badly charred because many of the victims could not get out of their cars as their doors were shut by the pressure of the explosion," the source added. Meanwhile, the Iraqiya state-run channel reported that two of its employees working for Hilla office, were among the killed. The two were at the checkpoint heading from their homes in the town of Mussaiyab, some 50 km south of Baghdad, to the office in Hilla. No group has so far claimed responsibility for the deadly attack, but the al-Qaida front in Iraq, in most cases, were allegedly responsible for such massive attacks in the country, raising fears that the terrorist group and other militia could return to widespread violence. In a separate incident, gunmen opened fire at a minibus carrying employees of the government-owned North Oil Company near the city of Tuz-Khurmato, some 200 km north of Baghdad, killing three and wounding six. The assault occurred in early hours of the day when the employees left their homes for work. In Iraq's northern province of Nineveh, gunmen shot dead Brigadier General Salim Hassan, an officer in the provincial intelligence service, near his house in eastern the provincial capital city of Mosul, some 400 km north of Baghdad, a provincial police source said. Elsewhere, a soldier was killed and three others wounded when a roadside bomb went off near an army patrol in Abu Ghraib area, some 25 km west of Baghdad, a local police source said. In Iraq's western province of Anbar, two people were killed in mortar and artillery shelling on Nu'imiyah area, in the southern part of the militant-seized city of Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, a provincial police source said. Anbar province has been the scene of fierce clashes that flared up after Iraqi police dismantled an anti-government protest site outside Ramadi in late December last year. Iraq is witnessing its worst violence in recent years. According to the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq, a total of 8,868 Iraqis, including 7,818 civilians and civilian police personnel, were killed in 2013, the highest annual death toll in years.