国际英语新闻:24 killed in violent attacks in Iraq

BAGHDAD, May 5 (Xinhua) -- A total of 24 people were killed and 29 wounded in separate violent incidents across the country on Monday, police and medical sources said.

In Salahudin province, two soldiers and a civilian were killed and 16 people wounded when a car bomb parking near a popular restaurant was detonated in the city of Tuz-Khurmato, some 90 km east of the provincial capital city Tikrit, a provincial police source said.

Also in the province, two policemen were gunned down by armed men near the city of Baiji, some 30 km north of Tikrit, the source said.

Salahudin province is a Sunni-dominated province and Tikrit is the hometown of former president Saddam Hussein.

In Baghdad, gunmen using silenced weapons shot dead a government employee when he was driving his private car on a highway in the eastern part of Baghdad, a police source said.

In Anbar province, two soldiers were killed and six others wounded when fierce clashes erupted in Albu-Assaf area, just northwest of the provincial capital city of Ramadi, some 110 km west of Baghdad, a provincial police source said.

In a separate incident, gunmen attacked an army force in central Ramadi, leaving a soldier killed and two others wounded, along with seizing a military armored vehicle, the source said.

In addition, airstrikes and artillery shelling on the city of Fallujah, some 50 km west of Baghdad, and the nearby town of Saqlawiyah, killed 15 people and wounded five others, the source said, adding that a woman and a child were among the killed.

Residents in Fallujah and nearby areas as well as officials in Fallujah hospital have frequently accused the Iraqi army of indiscriminately targeting their neighborhoods, but defense officials denied and said that they are targeting militants.

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.

Iraq is currently witnessing some of its worst violence in recent years. According to the UN Assistance Mission for Iraq, a total of 8,868 Iraqis, including 7,818 civilians and civilian police personnel, were killed in 2013, the highest annual death toll in years.