Car bombs in Baghdad, Iraqi town kill 34 people

BAGHDAD (AP) — Car bombs hit several mostly Shiite neighborhoods of Baghdad and a town south of the Iraqi capital on Wednesday, killing at least 34 people and wounding dozens, officials said, the latest bout of violence ahead of the country’s first parliamentary elections since the 2011 U.S. troop withdrawal.

No group immediately claimed responsibility for the attacks but the bombings bore the hallmarks of an al-Qaida-inspired group and other Sunni insurgents, who frequently use suicide and car bombs to target public areas and government buildings in their bid to undermine confidence in the Shiite-led government.