Terror blast kills four Iraqi schoolchildren

Four Iraqi primary school pupils were killed and two wounded on Monday when a booby-trapped car targeting security forces exploded, security and medical officials said.

The vehicle had been parked near the school in the town of Hit, 160 kilometers west of Baghdad.

It exploded at around 8:00am as the children were arriving for classes and as a security forces anti-terrorism unit passed by, the officials said.

Colonel Ayada al-Nimrawi, deputy police chief in Hit, said the blast killed four children and wounded another two. Dr Subhi Abad al-Alouani who attended the scene confirmed the toll.

They said members of the security patrol were unscathed.

Deadly attacks still occur almost every day across Iraq, although overall violence is down from its peak in 2006-2007.

Iraq has faced continued instability since a US-led invasion in 2003 uprooted the state, and opened the door to an influx of rogue militias.

Also on Monday, a five-year-old Iraqi boy was pounced upon and killed by a wolf as he picked dates in a palm grove near the town of Hilla in central Iraq, a witness and a doctor said.

Abbas Mohammed busy picking dates on Sunday with five older boys in the village of Al-Ahamer when the animal attacked them. All except Mohammed managed to flee.

"The wolf attacked the boy, lunging at his neck," witness Kadum Mohammed, 20, told AFP, adding that it was the first time such an attack had occurred in the area.

Dr Mohammed Jassem, from the hospital in Hilla 100 kilometers south of Baghdad, confirmed receiving the boy's body.

Jassem said the child's abdomen had been completely torn open by the wild animal.

(AFP, Al-Akhbar)