BAGHDAD: Attacks in Iraq killed 13 people yesterday, four of them worshippers, while militants bombed a major oil pipeline, halting exports via Turkey, officials said.
Security forces have launched major operations against militants in recent weeks that are said to have resulted in scores of arrests, including 12 people detained yesterday on suspicion of planning a massive assault on Abu Ghraib prison outside Baghdad last month.
In the deadliest attack yesterday, a car bomb exploded after midday prayers at a place of worship in Al Zahraa, south of the capital, killing four people and wounding 14.
Militants have carried out attacks on both Sunni and Shia mosques this year, raising fears of a return to the all-out sectarian conflict that peaked in 2006 to 2007 and killed tens of thousands of people. In the northern province of Kirkuk, a car bomb killed three police.
In Salaheddin province, also north of Baghdad, bombers killed a soldier, an anti-Qaeda militiaman and two civilians.
And in Nineveh province, in the north, gunmen shot dead a former soldier and a civilian.
Militants in the province also bombed the main oil pipeline from northern Iraq to Turkey, near the town of Albu Jahash. The attack halted exports via the pipeline, a senior official from the North Oil Company said, adding that production was continuing but the oil was being stored.
Repairs to the pipeline, which runs from the northern oil hub of Kirkuk to the port of Ceyhan in Turkey and has been hit by dozens of attacks this year, are expected to take between one and three days, the official said.AFP
