Three car bombs killed at least 50 people in Iraq on Monday, including 35 in a single blast north of Baghdad and 10 in a rare attack in the south, officials said.
The bombing in Zubayr, near Basra in southern Iraq, was claimed by the extremist Islamic State group, which has controlled swathes of the country since last year but was thought to have little reach in the deep Shia south, AFP reported.
“At least 10 people were killed” in Zubayr, said Jabbar al-Saadi of the Basra provincial council’s security committee, adding that 24 people were wounded.
Bombings are rare in Iraq’s south, which is predominantly Shia and hard to penetrate for terrorist groups responsible for most such attacks in Baghdad and other parts of the country.
“The soldiers of the caliphate managed to detonate a parked car bomb amidst a gathering of polytheist Rafidha in Basra,” said the IS claim posted on social media.
IS routinely uses the term Rafidha to refer to Shia Muslims.
Two other car bombs went off in areas north of Baghdad that have been routinely targeted by the terrorists.
A blast in a market area of Khalis, around 55 kilometers from the capital, killed at least 35 people and wounded 74, a senior police officer said.
In Hosseiniyah, barely 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of Baghdad, a car bomb detonated in a busy area, killing five people and wounding at least 17, a police colonel said.
