3 civilians wounded in Kirkuk blast

KIRKUK / IraqiNews.com: Three civilians on Sunday were injured in an explosion that ripped through southwestern Kirkuk city, a local police source said. “Today, an improvised explosive device (IED) detonated in downtown al-Shoyoukh district near the old youth center, southwest Kirkuk, wounding three civilians,” Brig. Sarhad Qader told IraqiNews.com. The explosion caused damage to the center’s building. Kirkuk, 250 km (156 miles) north of the Iraqi capital Baghdad, sits on the ruins of a 5,000-year-old settlement. Because of the strategic geographical location of the city, Kirkuk was the battle ground for three empires, Assyria, Babylonia and Media which controlled the city at various times. Kirkuk is the centre of the northern Iraqi petroleum industry. It is a historically and ethnically mixed city populated by Assyrians, Kurds, Arabs and Iraqi Turkmen. The population was estimated at 1,200,000 in 2008. SS (P) 1