Bomb kills 11 in Iraq, highlights security fears

BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) — A suicide bomber killed six people Wednesday, including an Iraqi policeman, in an attack on security forces in a former insurgent stronghold in Iraq’s western Anbar province, police said. A Baghdad bombing killed five other people.

The attacks highlighted the security challenges still facing Iraq despite a sharp drop in violence, and the withdrawal of U.S. combat troops from Iraqi cities at the end of last month. The pullout signals the growing confidence of Iraqi forces to handle security on their own, though tension among the country’s factions remains a threat to stability.

Wednesday’s attack in the western city of Ramadi was carried out by a suicide bomber driving a minibus who struck a checkpoint of Iraqi soldiers and police, killing a policeman and five civilians, said a local police officer. Earlier reports said six policemen were among the dead.

The attack injured 19 others, including five police, said the officer in Ramadi, which is located some 70 miles west of Baghdad. The officer spoke on condition of anonymity because he was not authorized to talk to the media.

Anbar used to be a stronghold of the Sunni insurgency but has been relatively quiet in recent months, partly because Sunni tribal leaders joined up with U.S.-led forces to fight extremists.

On Wednesday evening, a bomb in Baghdad’s Sadr City district killed five people and injured 23, all of them men, a police officer and a hospital official said on condition of anonymity.

The bomb was hidden in a plastic bag and exploded close to a big tent that was being used for the funeral service of the wife of a Shiite tribal leader, the officials said. Only men were in the tent, and female mourners were in a nearby house.

Also Wednesday evening, a bomb went off in the mostly Shiite district of Karradah in central Baghdad, wounding nine civilians, police said.

There were no claims of responsibility for the blasts in Ramadi and Baghdad, but suspicion fell on Sunni extremists who have targeted security forces and Shiite communities in an apparent attempt to re-ignite sectarian strife and destabilize the country.