SULAIMANI (ESTA) — Islamic State (ISIS) militants believed to be behind last week’s deadly suicide bombing of Baghdad market had planned more attacks during Eid al-Adha, according to Iraq’s interior ministry.
The interior ministry released photos of five suspects on Sunday, who were arrested in connection to the suicide bombing.
A suicide bomber killed 30 people and injured more than 50 others in a crowded market in Sadr City neighborhood of Baghdad on Monday, the eve of Eid al-Adha.
Islamic State claimed responsibility for the attack, the group’s Nasheer news agency said on Telegram. It said one of its militants blew up his explosive vest among the crowds.
Iraqi security forces have dismantled “two terrorist networks in the provinces of Anbar and Kirkuk responsible for the July 19 attack in Sadr City”, the Iraqi military said.
“They were planning other attacks in other parts of Baghdad and other provinces during Eid,” the interior ministry said in a statement.
On Sunday, the Kurdistan Region’s counter-terrorism directorate said it had also detained a suspect following a request from Baghdad.
Iraqi Prime Minister Mustafa al-Kadhimi announced on Saturday the arrest of the “terror cell” behind the suicide bombing.
It was the third time an explosion has hit Sadr, the mainly Shia Muslim neighborhood of Baghdad, in recent months, with the last one in June wounding 11 people.
In April, the Sunni Muslim militant group Islamic State claimed responsibility for a car bomb attack on a market in Sadr City, Baghdad’s main Shi’ite Muslim neighborhood, that killed four people and wounded 20.
Islamic State also claimed responsibility for a bomb attack last January that killed more than 30 in the crowded Tayaran Square market in central Baghdad – Iraq’s first big suicide bombing for three years.
