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Dozens killed and wounded in Sadr City truck bombing

At least 15 dead in latest attack targeting Shia suburb of Baghdad which has been repeatedly attacked by Islamic State in recent months
Local residents survey the scene of an earlier bombing on 2 January. Sadr City has been regularly targeted in recent months (AFP)

A suicide bomber detonated a pick-up truck on Wednesday in Sadr City, a heavily populated poor Shia-majority suburb of Baghdad, killing at least 15 and wounding 50, security sources said.

The explosion targeted a crowded street full of garages and used car dealers.

No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack.

But it appears to bear the hallmarks of the Islamic State group (IS), which stepped up bombings in Iraq last year in response to the US-backed campaign by Iraqi security forces to dislodged the hardline Sunni group from the Iraqi cities it took over in 2014.

Baghdad and other Iraqi cities were rocked by a series of deadly bombings last month which killed dozens of people.

At least 39 people were killed and scores more injured in an explosion in Sadr City on 2 January.

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