TIKRIT, Iraq, May 31 (Xinhua) -- Two paramilitary Hashd Shaabi members were killed and three others wounded Thursday in a bomb attack in Iraq's central province of Salahudin, a provincial police source said.
Early in the morning, a roadside bomb went off near a Hashd Shaabi patrol on a main road near the town of Tuz-Khurmato, some 90 km east of the provincial capital Tikrit, destroying a military vehicle along with killing two paramilitary fighters and wounding three aboard, Captain Ahmed al-Obeidi told Xinhua.
A joint police and Hashd Shaabi force carried out a search operation in the area looking for the attackers, Obeidi said.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack in the volatile area near the ethnically-mixed city of Tuz-Khurmato, which is mostly made up of Turkoman Shiite as well as sizable Kurdish and Sunni Arab population.
Previously, the city witnessed repeated clashes between the Kurds and Shiite militias, as the city and surrounding areas are part of the disputed areas outside the Kurdistan region, which are claimed by the Kurds and both Arabs and Turkomans. The Kurds want to incorporate the areas on the edge of their Kurdistan region, but their move is fiercely opposed by Baghdad government and non-Kurdish residents.
Meanwhile, remnants of Islamic State militants have been regrouping in rugged areas in the eastern part of Salahudin province, where the town is located, as well as in Himreen mountainous area, and are carrying out almost daily attacks against civilians and Iraqi forces.
