Thirteen people killed in separate attacks in Baghdad

Photo: Thirteen people killed in separate attacks in Baghdad

Iraqi police said Thursday that at least 13 people were killed in scattered attacks across Baghdad and its northern suburbs.

Northeast of Baghdad, a roadside bomb exploded near a convoy carrying the police chief of Balad Ruz, Col. Faris al-Amirie, police said. Six of al-Amirie's guards were killed and eight others were hurt, but the chief escaped injury, they said.

Balad Ruz is an ethnically mixed city 70 kilometers (45 miles) northeast of Baghdad.

Meanwhile in the capital, another roadside bomb killed five people near a shelter used as a police recruiting center in the Shiite-dominated neighborhood of Binouk, police said.

The blast went off at around 9:20 a.m. on a road leading to an Interior Ministry building used to process police recruits there, they said.

Six other people were wounded, they said. Most of the victims were recruits lining up outside the shelter.

And in Sadiyah, 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad, police said a cluster of three attacks took place around 10:40 a.m., killing two soldiers and wounding three others.

In one of the attacks, a car bomb exploded on an Iraqi army base, killing two soldiers and wounding three, police said.

Nearby, a roadside bomb damaged a police vehicle but its occupants escaped without injury, police said. Immediately afterward, a suicide bomber wearing an explosives belt tried to rush the convoy, but police began shooting at him. He fled the area and blew himself up in a nearby orchard, police said.

Another explosion went off near a hospital in Sadiyah, and police said there were casualties but could not confirm the number or severity of injuries.