Najaf, Iraq // At least 33 people were killed when ISIL militants detonated two suicide bombs in southern Iraq on Sunday.
The attacks in the city of Samawa were a rare strike in the Shiite heartland in Iraq’s far south.
Hospital officials said at least 50 people were also wounded in the blasts.
“Two car bombs went off in town. The first one was at around midday near a bus station in the city centre,” a senior police officer in Muthanna province said.
“The other exploded about five minutes later, 400 metres from the spot of the first explosion,” he said.
ISIL issued a statement later on social media claiming two suicide attackers detonated their car bombs against members of the security forces. The second bomb targeted security forces rushing to the scene of the first blast, the militants said.
A car bomb just outside Baghdad on Saturday killed at least 23 people, according to security and medical sources.
That attack targeted Shiite faithful walking to a northern Baghdad shrine.
ISIL has carried out several large and very deadly bomb attacks south of Baghdad in recent weeks.
*Agence France-Presse