BAGHDAD, Dec. 12 (Xinhua) -- Four paramilitary Hashd Shaabi members were killed in a suicide attack in the city of Samarra in Iraq's central province of Salahudin, the second on Thursday, the Iraqi military said.
The attack took place in the evening when a suicide bomber detonated his explosive-laden car near the Hashd Shaabi's force 313 Brigade in the west of Samarra, some 120 km north of the capital Baghdad, killing four of them, said the media office of Iraqi Joint Operations Command (JOC) in a statement.
The attack is the second in the evening as a JOC statement said earlier that a suicide bomber attacked the same force in Samarra, killing seven members and injuring three others.
The two statements gave no further details but said more information was to be released later.
Mohammed Khalil al-Bazi from Salahudin's police told Xinhua that the first attack was carried out by a suicide car bomber and targeted the brigade on a main road in the south of Samarra.
The 313 Brigade is part of Saraya al-Salam, or Peace Companies, headed by the Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr. The militia is stationed in Samarra area to protect the holy Shiite shrines where the tombs of two revered Imams are located.
No group has so far claimed responsibility for the attack. The self-styled Islamic State (IS) militant group, in most cases, was responsible for such attacks.
The security situation in Iraq has improved since Iraqi security forces fully defeated the extremist IS militants across the country late in 2017.
