BREAKING NEWS

Car bombs and mortar attacks kill at least 17 in Iraq

BAGHDAD - At least 17 people were killed in violence across Iraq on Saturday, including by car bombs and a mortar attack on a Shi'ite Muslim village, police and medical sources said.
The deadliest attack took place in a village near the Iraqi city of Baquba, 65 km (40 miles) northeast of Baghdad, where three mortar bombs killed six people, police said.
A woman and a child were among the victims, five of whom belonged to the same family, the police said, adding that the assailants might have been aiming at a nearby police station.
Violence in Iraq climbed back to its highest level in five years in 2013, when nearly 9,000 people were killed, most of them civilians, according to the United Nations.
No group immediately claimed responsibility for any of the latest attacks, but Sunni Islamist militants, some linked to al-Qaida, have been regaining momentum in Iraq, emboldened by the conflict in neighboring Syria, where they are also active.