Ramadi: A car bomb followed by a
suicide attack on Friday in the mostly Sunni Arab western Iraqi
city of Ramadi killed at least eight people, including five
policemen, police and a doctor said.
The car bomb in the city centre attracted a crowd, at
which point a suicide attacker detonated his explosives-laden
vest, a police major said, speaking on condition of anonymity.
The attacks, at around 7:15 pm (1615 GMT), left at least
eight people dead and 15 others wounded, a doctor at Ramadi
hospital said.
Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province and 100 kilometres
west of Baghdad, has frequently been the target of attacks in
recent months, despite a drop in violence across Iraq since
its peak in 2006 and 2007.
On January 17, a suicide bomber blew up an
explosives-packed car in a convoy carrying Anbar governor
Qassim Mohammed Abid, wounding three bodyguards and six
policemen but leaving Abid unharmed.
Anbar provincial government offices in Ramadi were
targeted by attackers three times in 2010, and on December 30,
2009, Abid lost his left hand in a suicide attack that killed
23 people and wounded 30.
The province was a key Sunni insurgent base in the years
after the 2003 US-led invasion, but since 2006 local tribes
have sided with the American military and day-to-day violence
has dropped dramatically.
PTI
