Iraq
A picture shows the scene of a twin suicide bombing in the heart of Baghdad on January 21, 2021. Photo: Sabah Arar/AFP
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region — At least 28 people have been killed and 73 injured in a double suicide bombing in Baghdad, the director of Iraq's civil defense department Kadhim Salman Bohan has told reporters at the scene of the attack.
A senior official from the Ministry of Interior previously put the death toll at 17.
"A number of citizens" were killed and injured in the attack on a crowded open-air market in the capital's central Tayaran Square, close to Baghdad's landmark Tahrir Square, state media reported on Thursday morning.
After months of coronavirus lockdowns last year, the market was particularly busy at the time of the attack, AFP said.
Yehia Rasool, the spokesperson for Iraq's commander-in-chief, said two suicide bombers blew themselves up after being pursued by security forces in the capital's Bab al-Sharqi area.
Photos and video footage purportedly from the scene show at least seven bodies at the site of the attack, near market stalls and vendors.
Video footage circulating on social media purportedly shows the moment a suicide bomber attacked Baghdad's Tayaran Square on Thursday morning
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The Ministry of Health has informed all hospitals in the area to be prepared to receive the wounded.
Canada's Ambassador to Iraq Ulric Shannon took to Twitter to condemn the "disgusting" attack.
Suicide bombings have become relatively rare in Baghdad in recent months. The last such attack took place in June 2019 and left several people dead, according to AFP.
Thurday's bombings have not been claimed by any group, but suicide bombings are a common method of attack used by the Islamic State (ISIS), which has sleeper cells across the country.
After seizing swathes of the country in the summer of 2014, the terror group was announced territorially defeated in Iraq in 2017, but continues to launch attacks against both civilians and members of the security forces, particularly in Iraq's northern provinces and territory disputed between Baghdad and Erbil.
According to ISIS' propaganda agency Amaq, the terror group carried out 1,422 attacks in Iraq in 2020, with the highest number of attacks recorded in Diyala province.
A total of 2,748 were killed as a result, the agency said earlier this month.
Updated at 12:53 pm
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