Ramadi, Iraq, March (Xinhua) — Ten people were killed and 26 others wounded in Thursday’s suicide bomb attack at a government bank in Iraq’s western province of Anbar, a provincial police source said.
“Our latest report said that eight soldiers and two civilians were killed and 26 people wounded, including 20 soldiers, by the suicide bomb attack in the town of Haditha,” the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.
The attack took place around midday when a suicide bomber blew up his explosive vest in a crowd of civilians and Iraqi army soldiers, who gathered to collect salaries at the branch of the government-owned al-Rafdain bank in Haditha, some 210 km northeast of Baghdad, the source said.
Iraqi security forces sealed off the scene, blocked the entrances of the town and imposed a curfew until further notice, as dozens of soldiers and policemen with their military vehicles were deployed across the town, the source added.
Earlier, the source put the toll at eight killed and 10 wounded by the attack.
Violence and sporadic high-profile attacks are still common in the once volatile Sunni Arab area in west of Baghdad that stretches through Anbar province to Iraq’s western borders with Syria, Jordan and Saudi Arabia.
The province’s cities and its vast desert area have been relatively calm for more than three years after Sunni tribes and anti-U.S. insurgent groups turned to cooperate with the U.S. troops and Iraqi security forces against al-Qaida network in Iraq.
