At least 22 people have been killed and more than 30 injured after two car bombs exploded one after the other outside the compound of the Provincial Governor in the central Iraqi city of Diwaniyah, news reports quoting officials said on Tuesday.
The two explosions reportedly occurred almost simultaneously as the guards changed shifts at the checkpoint outside the Diwaniyah governorate building. Most of those killed were said to be policemen.
Officials said the attack was planned to target Provincial Governor Salim Hussein Alwan as he left the office in his convoy of vehicles. However, the Governor escaped the attack unhurt as he was delayed in leaving the building due to some unspecified reasons.
Diwaniyah, about 80 miles south of Baghdad, is the capital of the normally quiet southern Iraqi province of Qadissiyah, a predominately Shia-dominated area where several of Iraq’s armed militant groups are said to be still active.
Although violence has dropped across Iraq in recent years, the country still witnesses such attacks on a regular basis. Most of the attacks are blamed on Sunni Islamist insurgents, who are still active in the country despite ongoing efforts to improve the country’s security.
Last week, at least eight people were killed after gunmen stormed the compound of the provincial government in Baquba, capital of Diyala province, after detonating two car bombs outside.
Diyala province was earlier considered to be the hotbed of al-Qaeda insurgency in Iraq, but the security situation improved after the introduction of U.S.-backed local anti-al-Qaeda groups known as Awakening Councils.
The attack in Baquba came just three months after a similar assault on the provincial council headquarters in the northern Iraqi city of Tikrit, capital of Salahuddin province, that left at least 55 dead. Also, a suicide attack in Tikrit had killed 52 police recruits in January.
The latest incident of violence comes nearly ten months after U.S. combat mission in Iraq ended its operations on August 31 last year, a move in line with a bilateral security agreement that called for withdrawal of all U.S. troops from the country by the end of 2011.
Presently, less than 50,000 U.S. soldiers remain in Iraq to advise and assist Iraqi security forces, conduct partnered counter-terrorism operations and protect U.S. civilians until all U.S. troops are withdrawn by the year-end.Also, outgoing
But U.S. Defense Secretary-designate Leon Panetta had indicated earlier this month that Iraqi government was likely to ask the United States to leave some of its soldiers in the Middle East nation beyond the year-end troop pullout deadline.
