Iraq: Car bomb at Baghdad market kills at least 16

BAGHDAD — A car bomb ripped through an outdoor market in a Shiite-dominated Baghdad neighborhood on Tuesday, killing at least 16 people, officials said, the latest in a wave of deadly militant attacks far from the front lines in the country’s north and west where Iraqi forces are battling the Islamic State group.

No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attack, though it bore the hallmarks of the extremist IS group, which has been behind recent deadly attacks in the area. IS controls significant areas in northern and western Iraq, including the country’s second-largest city of Mosul.

An Iraqi police officer said the initial investigation shows Tuesday’s explosion in the northeastern Shaab neighborhood came from an explosives-laden car that was parked near the market.

The blast also wounded up to 45 people, he said, and a medical official confirmed the casualty figures. Both officials spoke on condition of anonymity as they were not authorized to talk to reporters.

Commercial and public places in Shiite-dominated areas are among the most frequent targets for the Sunni militants seeking to undermine the Iraqi government efforts to maintain security inside the capital.

But he Islamic State has not confined its latest attacks only to Baghdad.

Earlier Tuesday, Iraqi oil workers resumed work at a natural gas plant north of Baghdad, two days after a coordinated dawn assault by IS left at least 14 people dead there, a senior Oil Ministry official said.

Sunday’s spectacular attack in the town of Taji, about 20 kilometers (12 miles) north of Baghdad, saw a suicide car bombing at the facility’s main gate, followed by several IS fighters breaking into the plant where they clashed with security forces for hours before the attackers were repelled.

The dead included six civilians and eight security forces while 27 Iraqi troops were wounded. Closed-circuit television images showed an explosion that sent thick black smoke rising above the plant. As flames engulfed the facility and nearby palm trees, pedestrians were seen running for cover. The top of one of the gas-processing units was blown off.

It took hours before Iraqi troops repelled the attackers.

On Tuesday, work at the plant’s three production lines returned “to normal levels,” said Deputy Oil Minister Hamid Younis.

The plant was back to full capacity of producing 30,000 cooking gas cylinders a day, he said, adding that Sunday’s attack had only damaged two gas storages and a few pipelines.

Iraqi state TV showed workers in navy blue overalls filling metal and plastic cylinders on conveyor belts and forklift trucks loading cylinders into trucks.

The assault on Taji came as Islamic State militants are being pushed back along several front lines in Iraq, prompting the Sunni extremists to increasingly turn to insurgency-style attacks to detract from their losses.

IS-claimed attacks have killed more than 140 people since last week in Iraq. After its 2014 blitz, the IS declared an Islamic caliphate on the territory it holds in Iraq and Syria and at the height of its power was estimated to hold nearly a third of Iraq. Iraq’s government says the group’s hold has since shrunk to 14 percent of Iraq’s territory.