Twin Baghdad car bombs kill 23, wound dozens

BAGHDAD — Two car bombs exploded in Baghdad Sunday morning as commuters were starting their work week, killing at least 23 people and wounding dozens of others, Iraqi officials said. The blasts broke what has been a period of relative calm since the end of the Muslim fasting month of Ramadan and underlined the challenges facing Iraqi security officials in protecting their capital city. Ten people were killed when a car bomb exploded in western Baghdad's affluent Mansour neighborhood, Army Brig. Gen. Ali Fathal who is responsible for the western half of the city, told The Associated Press. He said another 10 were wounded in the attack, and security officials are investigating whether it was the work of a suicide car bomb targeting a crowded commercial area near an AsiaCell store, one of Iraq's biggest mobile phone providers. Minutes later another car bomb exploded in Kazimiyah neighborhood's Adan square in the northern sector of the city, killing at least 13 and wounding more than 70 others, police and hospital sources said. Two policemen were killed in the blast. Police said the Kazimiyah blast was the work of a suicide car bomber targeting a checkpoint in a residential area leading to a branch office of the Ministry of National Security. Earlier Sunday, two people in a minibus were killed when a roadside bomb went off in the Shula neighborhood of northwestern Baghdad, police and hospital officials said. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak on record. —AP