BAGHDAD: Two suicide bombers today killed at least 34 people and injured 70 in an attack on the home of an anti-terrorism officer in northern Iraq, while three roadside bombs in Baghdad killed seven others, authorities said.

The attacks came a day after car bombs in two Shiite villages near the northern Iraqi city of Mosul killed 16 civilians and injured more than two dozen, in a surge of violence in Iraq’s troubled north following the withdrawal of US combat forces from cities to bases outside urban centres at the end of June.

Iraq is trying to build on security gains made in the past two years, though political reconciliation among the country’s factions remains a troubled process and there is concern that insurgent attacks could trigger a slide back into sectarian violence.

Major General Khalid al-Hamadani, the police chief of the northern Ninevah province, said the first bomber, wearing a police uniform and carrying a radio and a pistol, knocked on the door of a police

officer who works as an investigator in the anti-terrorism police department in Tal Afar city.

When the officer opened the door around 6:30 am, the bomber detonated his explosive belt, killing the officer, his wife and son, al-Hamadani said. As people gathered near the scene, another suicide bomber detonated his explosives belt. At about 7:30 am in Baghdad, two roadside bombs exploded near an outdoor market in the Shiite district of Sadr City, killing six and injuring 31, said

Major General Qassim al-Mousawi, spokesman for the city’s operations command centre.

Explosives experts defused a third bomb in the area. Hassan Abdullah, 32, a vegetable salesman, said he heard the first blast.

25 dead in blast in Afghanistan

Kabul: A massive bomb blast on Thursday in central Afghanistan killed 25 people including 13 primary school students, destroying shops and scattering pieces of the vehicle that carried the explosives over a huge area.

Another bombing in the south killed two American troops.

The bomb in central Afghanistan was detonated after a truck carrying timber overturned, killing 21 civilians and four policemen in Logar province, south of Kabul, said ministry spokesman Zemerai Bashary.

At least 13 of those killed were children from nearby schools, said

Kamaluddin Zadran, a provincial official.

Provincial police chief Mustafa Khan said the truck overturned on Wednesday as it travelled the main road from Logar to Kabul. In the southern province of Zabul, Afghan and coalition troops battled Taliban militants who attacked a government centre in Suri district on Thursday. — AP