Suicide bomber kills 48 students in Nigeria.

POTISKUM | Dwan | AP | 10 nov 2014 : : A suicide bomber disguised in school uniform detonated explosives at a high school assembly in the northeast Nigerian city of Potiskum on Monday, killing at least 48 students, according to survivors and a morgue attendant.

Soldiers rushed to the scene, grisly with body parts, in the capital of Yobe state, but they were chased away with stones and calls by people angry at the military's inability to halt a five-year-old Islamic insurgency that has killed thousands and driven hundreds of thousands from their homes.

A suicide bomb attack in the same city killed 30 people one week ago, when suspected Boko Haram fighters attacked a religious procession of moderate Muslims.

Some 2,000 students had gathered for Monday morning's weekly assembly at the Government Technical Science College when the explosion blasted through the school hall, according to survivors who spoke on condition of anonymity for fear of repercussions.

“We were waiting for the principal to address us, around 7:30 am, when we heard a deafening sound and I was blown off my feet, people started screaming and running, I saw blood all over my body,” 17-year-old student Musa Ibrahim Yahaya said from the general hospital, where he was being treated for head wounds.

Hospital workers said dozens are being treated including people with serious injuries that may need amputations.

A morgue attendant said 48 bodies were brought to the hospital and all appeared to be between the ages of 11 and 20 years old. He spoke on condition of anonymity because he is not authorised to give information to reporters. (Courtesy : Dawn.com)

Suicide attack in Baghdad cafe kills 12 people.

Suicide attack in Baghdad cafe kills 12 people.

BAGHDAD | 21 March 2014 : : A suicide bomber struck inside a Baghdad cafe overnight where customers were watching a football game on TV, killing at least 12 people and wounding 38, Iraqi officials said Thursday.

The attack in the western Washash neighborhood took place late on Wednesday night, two police officers said. The bomber had mingled with the cafe crowd and set off his explosives-laden belt as they watched the game.

A medical official confirmed the casualty figures. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they are not authorized to talk to the media.

Iraq has been struck by a surge in violence unseen since 2007, relentless attacks that have become the Shiite-led government's most serious challenge.

Violence has spiked since last April, when security forces cracked down on a Sunni protest camp north of Baghdad in clashes that left 45 dead.

Scores of people have been killed in the Iraqi capital, in recent attacks that have targeted busy areas, restaurants and other public places.

On Tuesday, a series of bombings struck both commercial streets and security forces in Baghdad and its surroundings, killing 15 people.

No one has claimed responsibility for the latest attacks, but they bear the hallmarks of an Al Qaeda breakaway group that frequently uses car bombs and suicide attacks to target public areas such as cafes, restaurants, mosques and markets to undermine the government's efforts to maintain security in the country.

According to the UN 8,868 people were killed in Iraq last year the country's highest death toll since a peak of sectarian bloodletting in 2007. ( Courtesy : Dawn )

                 

Suicide bombing in park, attacks kill 32 in Iraq.

Suicide bombing in park, attacks kill 32 in Iraq.

BAGHDAD | AP | 24 Aug  2013  :: A suicide bomber attacked a park in northern Baghdad crowded by cafe- and restaurant-goers Friday night, the bloodiest attack in a day of violence that killed at least 32 people across the country, authorities said.

Attacks have been on the rise in Iraq since a deadly security crackdown in April on a Sunni protest camp. More than 3,000 people have been killed in violence during the past few months, raising fears Iraq could see a new round of widespread sectarian bloodshed similar to that which brought the country to the edge of civil war in 2006 and 2007.

The suicide bomber struck a park in the Qahira neighborhood of Baghdad late Friday night, an area popular with locals, police said. The bomber detonated his explosives in a crowd of people, killing at least 26 people and wounding 55.

Violence has stepped up in strikes on so-called soft targets in Iraq — like civilians at coffee shops or those shopping along busy commercial streets.

There was no claim of responsibility for Friday's suicide bombing. Sunni extremists such as al-Qaida's Iraq arm that seek to undermine the Shiite-led government are frequently blamed for attacks targeting civilians.

Elsewhere in the country, police said gunmen broke into a house of a Shiite merchant at dawn Friday in the northern town of Dujail, killing him, his wife and elderly mother. Authorities said the motive behind the killing wasn't immediately unclear.

Dujail, about 80 kilometers (50 miles) north of Baghdad, is a Shiite Muslim town surrounded by Sunni areas.

Meanwhile, two police officers said bombs exploded near Sunni mosques in two neighborhoods in Baghdad as worshippers were leaving after Friday's sermon, killing three people and wounding 18.

Police officers and medical officials confirmed the casualty figures from the attacks Friday. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to release the information to journalists.(Courtesy:USA TODAY)

Suicide bomber kills eight Kurdish security personnel in Iraq.

Suicide bomber kills eight Kurdish security personnel in Iraq.

TIKRIT | Retures | 28 Jul 2013 ::  A suicide bomber driving a car packed with explosives blew himself up near a Kurdish security forces patrol killing at least eight of them early on Sunday, police said.

The attack took place in the centre of the ethnically mixed town of Tuz Khurmato, 170 km north of the capital Baghdad, in a notoriously unstable region over which both the central government and autonomous Iraqi Kurdistan claim jurisdiction.

No group claimed responsibility but suicide bombings are the trademark of Al Qaeda, which has been regaining momentum in its insurgency against the Shia-led Baghdad government.

More than 4,000 people have been killed by militants in Iraq this year, of which more than 800 were killed in July alone, according to violence monitoring group Iraq Body Count.

Sectarian tensions across the region have been inflamed by the civil war in neighbouring Syria, putting growing strain on Iraq, where Kurds, Shia and Sunni Muslims have yet to find a stable way of sharing power.

Sunni insurgents, including the al Qaeda-affiliated Islamic State of Iraq, have been recruiting from Iraq's Sunni minority, which resents Shia domination of their country since the US-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein in 2003.(Courtesy:Dawn)