12 killed in Iraq violence

At least 12 people, including nine suspected militants, were killed in various incidents of violence in Iraq on Tuesday, officials said.

Iraqi security forces killed nine suspected militants and captured over 300 others during a security operation which was part of a major offensive, dubbed “Revenge for Martyrs,” aimed at hunting down militant groups, a defence ministry statement said, Xinhua reported.

The troops seized hundreds of bombs and dozens of weapons and defused a car bomb factory, the statement said, without giving further details about when and where exactly the suspected militants were killed and captured.

A woman and her child were killed and another person was injured when a roadside bomb went off in Kan’an town near Diyala’s provincial capital city of Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad, a police source said.

In a separate incident, gunmen shot dead a soldier at a village near Jalawlaa city, some 70 km north of Baquba, the source said.

Iraq is witnessing its worst eruption of violence in recent years, which raises fears that the country is sliding back to a full-blown civil conflict that peaked in 2006 and 2007 when monthly death toll sometimes exceeded 3,000.

The UN Assistance Mission for Iraq recently reported that over 1,000 Iraqis were killed and more than 2,300 wounded in acts of terrorism and violence in July, the deadliest month in more than five years.

-IANS