Iraq bomb attacks kill at least 17

Baghdad (CNN) -- At least 17 people were killed Thursday in bomb attacks in a city near Baghdad and the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk, police officials said.

Police in Baghdad said 10 people were killed, including two women and three children, when insurgents placed bombs around a house in Musayyeb, a city about 43 miles (70 kilometers) south of the capital.

Two police officers, who were brothers, were among those killed in the explosion early Thursday, police said. The house was severely damaged.

Later Thursday, armed men shot four civilians to death in western Baghdad's al-Yarmouk neighborhood, police said. A fifth civilian died and another 18 were wounded when two bombs exploded in a coffee shop in al-Saydiya, on the south side of the capital.

A roadside bomb wounded two people in Baghdad's Abu Dasheer neighborhood Thursday evening, but no fatalities were immediately reported, according to police.

Meanwhile, two civilians were killed and three others wounded when a motorcycle rigged with explosives detonated in a mixed neighborhood in southwestern Kirkuk on Thursday morning, police there said. The ethnically mixed, oil-rich city is about 150 miles (240 kilometers) north of Baghdad.

Since the beginning of the year, a wave of attacks in Iraq has killed about 200 people. The violence has raised concerns about the ability of Iraqi security forces to ensure order, particularly after the United States withdrew troops at the end of 2011.

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