Al Arabiya , 28 June 2012 – Three bombings in and around Baghdad killed 14 people and wounded more than 50 on Thursday, hospital sources and police said, the latest in a wave of attacks to raise fears of a return to widespread sectarian violence in Iraq.

In the deadliest of Thursday’s attacks, at least eight people were killed and 30 wounded when a bomb in a parked car exploded at the entrance of a Baghdad market in the mainly Shiite Muslim district of Washash, hospital sources and police said.

A separate car bomb attack in Taji, a town 20 km (12 miles) north of the capital, killed four and wounded 20 in the early hours of the morning, police said. The bomb in the mainly Sunni town was targeting a government building, which was severely damaged.
A roadside bomb targeting a police patrol killed one and wounded five in Abu Dsheer area in southern Baghdad, police said.

Violence in Iraq has fallen since a peak in 2006-07, but insurgents remain capable of lethal attacks.

Iraq’s Shiite, Sunni and Kurdish factions have been locked in political disputes since the last U.S. troops withdrew in December, aggravating existing tensions.

Thursday’s deaths brought to at least 199 the number of people killed in Iraq since June 13 -more than victims killed in all of May.

Attacks on June 13, which killed 72 people across the country, were later claimed by Al-Qaeda’s front group, the Islamic State of Iraq.

Two car bombs targeting Shiites commemorating the death of a revered imam killed 32 people in the capital on June 16.

Two days later, a suicide bomber killed 22 people in an attack on Shiite mourners in Baquba, north of Baghdad.

On Wednesday, three bombings killed 11 people, security and medical officials said.

Violence has declined significantly since its peak in 2006 and 2007, but attacks remain common, killing 132 people in May, government