‘Bombing wounds Iraqi governor’

The governor of Iraq’s eastern province of Diyala has been wounded in a car bombing, which killed two of his guards and injured six others, a provincial police says.

The attack occurred when the bomber detonated an explosives-laden vehicle at Governor Omar al-Humairi’s house in the provincial capital city of Baquba, some 65 km northeast of Baghdad, on Saturday.

No group has yet claimed responsibility for the attack, but militants affiliated with al-Qaeda are commonly blamed for such attacks in Iraq.

Also on Saturday, Sheikh Hassan Hadi al-Janabi, a provincial elections candidate in Babil province, was killed by a magnetic “sticky bomb” south of Baghdad.

On February 21, three soldiers were killed by unknown assailants north of the Iraqi capital, Baghdad, while one civilian was killed in a blast in Baquba.

In a series of car bombings on February 8, over 35 people were killed and nearly 100 others injured in mainly Muslims areas of Iraq, including the southern city of Karbala.

Violence has increased in Iraq since December 2011, when an arrest warrant was issued for fugitive Vice President Tariq al-Hashemi, who has been charged with running a death squad targeting Iraqi officials and Muslims.

Among Iraqi regions, Baghdad and Diyala have the highest per capita rate of civilian deaths in the country, according to monitor group Iraq Body Count.

The government has stepped up efforts to boost security across the country over the past few months.