15 killed in attacks in Iraq’s Anbar province

RAMADI, Iraq, April 27 (Xinhua) — A total of 15 people were killed and 26 others wounded in separate attacks across the Iraqi western province of Anbar on Sunday, security and medical sources said.

An explosive-laden car was blown up by a suicide bomber outside a base of police commando force in the western of provincial capital city of Ramadi, some 110 km west of Baghdad, killing five policemen and wounding two others, a provincial police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

Another suicide attack occurred in the western part of Ramadi when an explosive-packed car rammed into an army checkpoint, killing two soldiers and wounding five others, the source said.

Separately, gunmen blew up a bridge while a police patrol was passing on in the southern part of Anbar province, killing a policeman and wounding three others, along with destroying the bridge, the source added.

Also in the province, three civilians were killed and 12 others wounded by mortar barrage in the morning on several neighborhoods in the besieged city of Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, a medical source told Xinhua.

In a separate incident, Iraqi soldiers killed four militants, believed to be linked to ISIL, and wounded four others during an operation in town of Garma, a provincial police source said.

Earlier in the day, Iraqi army soldiers attacked a convoy of tankers used by Daish (Islamic State of Iraq and Levant ISIL) in Wadi Suwab area inside the Syrian territories, burning eight of them and killing the militants inside, a statement from al-Jazira and al-Badiyah Command said.

The attack occurred while the tankers were approaching the Iraqi borderline to provide the ISIL militant inside Iraq with fuel, the source said, adding that the operation was based on intelligence reports.

Anbar province has been the scene of fierce clashes that flared up after Iraqi police dismantled an anti-government protest site outside Ramadi in late December last year.

The attacks came just three days from Iraq’s April 30 parliamentary elections, the first in the country since the withdrawal of U.S. troops in late 2011.