Twin blasts hit wedding near Iraq’s Tikrit, kill 23: Government official

Irbil: Two bomb blasts, from an apparent suicide attack, hit a wedding party in a village near the Iraqi city of Tikrit on Wednesday, killed at least 23 people, a local government official said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the attack in Hajjaj, 20 km (14 miles) north of Tikrit.

In November Islamic State bomb attacks hit Tikrit and Samarra, both north of Baghdad, as an apparent diversionary attacks as Iraqi forces drive back the jihadists in their stronghold of Mosul.