Five killed in Iraq attacks: Officials



Five killed in Iraq attacks: Officials Baghdad: Bomb attacks on Monday in Baghdad and a town in western Anbar province killed five people and wounded seven, officials said, amid a surge in Iraq violence linked to stalled efforts to form a government.

A bomb at a bus shelter in the southern Baghdad district of Shurta killed two people and wounded four, an official at the interior ministry said.

In the town of Al-Garma, in Anbar province around 50 kilometres west of Baghdad, a bomb destroyed a policeman's house, killing three of his relatives, including a woman, and wounding three others, two of them women, according to the police.

Data released by the Iraqi ministries of the interior, health and defence on Saturday showed that July was the single deadliest month in the war-torn country since May 2008, with 535 people killed and 1,043 wounded.

But yesterday the US military took the unusual step of disputing the government's figures, claiming in a statement that 222 people were killed in Iraqi violence last month, including six US soldiers, and 782 people wounded.

US and Iraqi officials have warned of the dangers of an upsurge in violence as negotiations on forming a new government nearly five months after the March 7 general election drag on, giving insurgent groups an opportunity to further destabilise the country.

PTI