Bomb Blasts Rock Iraq Killing At Least 30

Car bombs killed at least 30 people across Iraq on Sunday (December 8) and wounded nearly a hundred, with attackers mainly targeting busy commercial streets in the capital, police sources said.

In one incident, two people were killed and ten others were wounded in a car bomb in a popular marketplace in Baghdad's Shi'ite slum of Sadr City.

Violence in Iraq is at the highest level in at least five years and the capital has been targeted almost daily. More than 8,000 have been killed this year, the United Nations says.

Sunni insurgents, mostly with links to al Qaeda, have claimed several large bombings in Iraq this year. The last large set of bombings was on Nov. 21 north of the capital. Since then, there has been a steady flow of smaller attacks.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for Sunday's bombings but al Qaeda has increased its grip on areas across the country since the escalation of the crisis in neighbouring Syria and the withdrawal of U.S. troops from Iraq in 2011.

At least 94 people were wounded in Sunday's attacks.

Presented by Adam Justice