Iraq officials say bombings kill 15 people

A series of bombings targeting commercial streets and security forces in Baghdad and its surroundings killed 15 people today, officials said.
Police officials said a car bomb also went off near shops in the Shiite holy city of Karbala in the afternoon, killing three people and wounding 16. Karbala is 80 kilometers south of Baghdad.
Also, police said a car bomb killed one person in the town of Hafriyah, just south of Baghdad. Minutes later, another car bomb exploded near a bus stop in the same town, killing two people and wounding five.
In southern Baghdad, a car bomb targeting a security checkpoint killed two policemen and wounded nine. In northern Baghdad, a roadside bomb explosion killed one person and wounded three others in the Shaab neighborhood, according to police.

Separately, two car bombs near a falafel restaurant and a bus stop in Hilla city killed three people and wounded 13 others.
Hilla, a Shiite-dominated city, is located about 95 kilometers south of Baghdad.

At night, a car bomb exploded in a commercial street in Baghdad's western district of Ghazaliyah, killing three people and wounding five others, said police.
Hospital medics confirmed the casualty figures. All officers spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to the media.
No one immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks, but they bore the hallmarks of an al-Qaeda breakaway group that frequently uses car bombs and suicide attacks to target public areas and members of security forces in their bid to undermine confidence in the government.

Violence has escalated in Iraq over the past year. Last year, the country saw the highest death toll since the worst of the country's sectarian bloodletting began to subside in 2007, according to United Nations figures. The UN said violence killed 8,868 last year in Iraq.