Three killed, 25 wounded in Iraq pilgrimage attacks

The attacks took place during the same religious pilgrimage in which were 1,000 people died five years ago in a stampede on a bridge as people made their way to the golden-domed shrine for the Imam Moussa al-Kadhim in the Kadhimiya district of the Iraqi capital.

Police said one pilgrim was killed and nine were wounded on Tuesday as they walked to Kadhimiya when three mortar rounds struck in the Shula district of northwestern Baghdad.

In New Baghdad, a roadside bomb targeting pilgrims killed by two and wounded five, police said.

Three other roadside bombs exploded in the Baghdad districts of the Bayaa, Abu Dsheer and in the northeastern section of the city, police said.

During a pilgrimage in 2005, rumors of a bombing on the Bridge of the Imams, which leads to the shrine, touched off with a stampede that clogged the river below with bodies.

Violence has fallen sharply in Iraq since the height of the sectarian slaughter in 2006-07 but attacks are still a daily occurrence as insurgents try to exploit a political vacuum after a March 7 election that produced no outright winner.

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