About 1,000 killed last week in Iraq

About 1,000 people were killed throughout Iraq in the
past week due to surging violent attacks, according to an estimate by
the Iraqi Interior Ministry.

The figure includes members of militia and terrorist groups,
civilians and Iraqi security forces, media reports quoted a ministry
official as saying on Sunday.

The statistics came just one day after one of the deadliest single
bomb attack in central Baghdad that killed at least 130 people and
wounded some 305.

The attack took place in Sedriya, a mixed district of Sunni Arabs,
Shiites and Kurds, as an explosive-laden truck loaded with food
detonated in the crowded vegetable market.

On Nov. 23, Shiites were targeted by a series of coordinated car
bomb attacks in Sadr City with at least 200 civilians killed.

The Health Ministry official said he expected the death toll from
the attack to rise.

Violence rages in Iraq as sectarian killings, suicide attacks,
bombings, abductions cause dozens of Iraqi casualties daily, though the
Iraqi government has announced a new security plan to quell the
sectarian violence and growing militia dominance. (Xinhuanet)