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53 die in attacks across Iraq

By Ramadan Al-Fatash –

BAGHDAD — Fifty-three people died in wave of attacks across Iraq Sunday that targeted mostly government security forces and Shiite-majority areas.

In the oil-rich city of Kirkuk, 155 miles north of the capital Baghdad, 12 people died in serial car bombings, police said. They included seven police recruits who were hit by a car bomb near an oil company. More than 50 people were injured in the bombings.

Twin car bombings in the southern town of Amara killed 12 and wounded more than 50 near a Muslim Shiite shrine.

A car bombing in the town of Taji, north of Baghdad, killed six civilians died and wounded seven, security officials said.

The attacks came on the day that a Baghdad court sentenced in absentia Iraq’s vice president, Tareq al-Hashemi, to death on terrorism charges.

Al-Hashemi, Iraq’s most senior Sunni Muslim official, has called the charges a political ploy by the Shiite-led government of Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki.

The Iraqiya bloc in Parliament, led by former Prime Minister Ayad Allawi, blamed security agencies for not stopping the attacks.

“These agencies are completely unable to protect the people’s lives. We call on all national powers in the country to stand united against all forms of terrorism and intimidation to frustrate all those taking advantage of the continued security fragility,” the group said.

Also in Kirkuk, two civilians were killed and 70 were injured in a car bombing, followed by a bomb blast near a government investigations office.

In Nassirya town, 230 miles south of Baghdad, two people were killed and four injured in a blast apparently targeting the French consulate. Two more were injured in an explosion near the town’s biggest hotel.

In the province of Salah al-Din, 105 miles north of Baghdad, 11 soldiers died and eight were injured when gunmen attacked an army checkpoint, police said.

An attack on a checkpoint in the area of Abu Gharib, west of Baghdad, killed three soldiers.

Two civilians died in a car bombing in a market in western Basra, 365 miles south of Baghdad. Twenty-four were wounded, said Hassan Khalati, a member of the Basra local council.

Basra has been relatively stable in recent years, compared to other areas in the country.

Three civilians were killed and 20 injured in car bombings in Shiite-majority areas in the northern city of Mosul, said security officials.

Such attacks have increased recently, triggering fears of a return to the extreme violence that peaked in 2006 and 2007, when thousands were killed in sectarian violence.

At least 325 people were killed in attacks in Iraq in July alone, the most of any month since August 2010, according to the government.

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