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So-called Islamic State says it was behind a car bomb attack outside a packed ice-cream parlour in Baghdad early on Tuesday that has reportedly left at least 16 people dead.
Some 75 more men, women and children were injured in the blast, just after midnight, which ISIL said targeted “a gathering” of Shi’ites.
Some reports said a suicide bomber was in the vehicle.
It happened in the mainly Shi’ite Karrada district of the Iraqi capital where families had gathered after sundown to break their fast during Islam’s holy month of Ramadan.
Amid the panic and confusion afterwards, reports spoke of a young girl with a bow in her hair wandering the scene looking dazed.
Baghdad car bombs kill more than 20 people https://t.co/RpHwfF4NoI
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A few hours later, a second car bomb killed at least 10 people and wounded dozens more near a government office in the Karkh district.
The commercial Karrada district was hit by a massive truck bomb in July 2016 that killed at least 324 people, the deadliest attack in Iraq since the US-led invasion of the country in 2003. That blast was also claimed by ISIL.
It is another sign of the Sunni extremist group’s determination to spread terror, despite coming under increasing pressure, notably in Mosul.
with Reuters