At Least 16 Killed by Bombing to the North of Baghdad - Reports

The death toll of the attack at funerals in a Sunni city to the north of Iraq's capital Baghdad has risen to 16, the AFP repotrted, citing a local Iraqi official.

Earlier in the day, Ali Dowdah, the town's head, said that ten people were killed and 14 injured when explosives detonated at a funeral for Sunni Muslim tribal fighters in the Iraqi town of Shirqat.

READ MORE: Iraq: At Least 8 Killed in Car Bomb Blast in Holy Shiite Town of Karbala

The funerals were held for three Sunni Muslim tribal fighters who had died earlier from the Popular Mobilisation Forces, a network of mainly Shiia state-backed militias that fight against Daesh, he reported.

عاجل رويترز عن مسؤول محلي: مقتل 10 في تفجير شمالي #بغداد https://t.co/uuwkBjDlqs pic.twitter.com/sQpJux3Ccc

— سمية الشوحه-الصنارة (@snarah_jo) April 12, 2018

Militants planted explosives at the grave site and detonated them during the funeral procession, according to the town's leader. 

Iraqi Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi declared victory over Daesh on Iraqi soil in December, however, militants continue to carry out bombings, assassinations and ambushes across the country. Thus the Iraqi capital regularly suffers from terrorist attacks. In March, two explosions at a wedding party in a village north of the city of Tikrit in Iraq have taken the lives of over two dozen people,