Dozens killed in Baghdad car bombing

The BBC's Mohamed Yehia says there has been "a steady drumbeat of violent attacks"

At least 82 people have been killed in three car bomb attacks in the Iraqi capital Baghdad, police and medics say.

The deadliest struck a market in the mainly Shia district of Sadr City during the morning rush hour, killing 64 people and wounding 87 others.

Two blasts in the afternoon in the northern area of Kadhimiya and in Jamia, in the west, left 18 dead.

It is not yet clear who was behind the later attacks, but so-called Islamic State claimed it was behind the first.

The Sunni Muslim jihadist group, which controls large swathes of northern and western Iraq, has frequently targeted Shia Muslims, whom it considers heretics.

Battle for Iraq and Syria in maps

Many of the victims in the Sadr City attack were children and women, including brides who appeared to be getting ready for their weddings at a beauty salon, Iraqi police and medical sources said.

Pictures showed vehicles and the facades of several buildings heavily damaged.

An eyewitness told the Associated Press that the bomb was in a pickup truck loaded with fruit and vegetables. Its driver parked the vehicle and quickly disappeared among the crowd, he said.

The attack targeted a busy market in a Shia district in northern Baghdad

It happened during a busy period of the morning

"It was such a thunderous explosion that jolted the ground," Karim Salih, 45, told the news agency.

"The force of the explosion threw me for metres and I lost consciousness for a few minutes."

Hours later, a suicide car bomb exploded outside a police station in Kadhimiya, a mostly Shia district that is the location of an important shrine, officials said.

Both police officers and civilians were among the dead.

At around the same time, another suicide car bomb reportedly targeted a commercial street in the Jamia district, which is predominantly Sunni.

Angry reaction

In the aftermath of the first bombing, angry survivors blamed the politicians for failing to protect them and ensure security, reports the BBC's Jim Muir in northern Iraq.

The bombing comes in the midst of an acute political crisis in Baghdad, with parliament unable to meet and the government effectively paralysed by factional disputes, he notes.

IS has frequently targeted commercial areas and government and security personnel, causing heavy casualties.

Iraqi forces, backed by US-led coalition air strikes and Shia-dominated paramilitary forces, have regained some territory seized by IS in 2014, but have been unable to prevent bomb attacks in the capital.

In February, Iraqi security forces began building a wall around Baghdad in an attempt to halt the group's attacks.

The UN says 1,885 civilians were killed by violence in Iraq in the first four months of this year.

Recent IS deadly bombings

March 2016: Suicide attack in a football match in the city of Iskandariya, in central Iraq, kills at least 32 people. Many of the dead were young boys who had been in a trophy ceremony.

March 2016: Fuel tanker is blown up at a checkpoint near Hilla, south of Baghdad, killing at least 47.

February 2016: Twin suicide bomb attack in a busy market in Sadr City kills at least 70.

August 2015: Truck bomb explodes at crowded market in Sadr City killing at least 67.

July 2015: Car bomb hits a busy market in the town of Khan Bani Saad killing 120.

Why does IS target Shia?

The group considers Shia to be irredeemable apostates subject to punishment by death.

Powerful Shia militias, which IS said it had targeted in Wednesday's attack, have also played a vital role in helping Iraqi government forces drive militants out of areas they captured in mid-2014.

Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi has in the past said the bombings in the capital are "desperate" attempts by IS militants to retaliate for the territorial losses, and analysts say they may increase in frequency as government forces advance on the northern city of Mosul.

What can't the government prevent attacks in Baghdad?

Vehicle scanners at the entrances to Baghdad have helped reduce the number of co-ordinated car bomb attacks since late 2014. But IS has changed tactics in response, and instead used suicide bombers and bombs planted in public spaces.

The security establishment is also plagued by corruption, and officers are allegedly easy to bribe. Expenditure on security has also reportedly been reduced, with the government's finances strained by the cost of the war against IS and declining oil revenue.

The authorities have also struggled to secure rural areas ringing the capital - the so-called "Baghdad belt" - where militants are known to shelter. Local Sunnis, many of whom have suffered abuses at the hands of the Shia-dominated security forces or were alienated by the sectarian policies of Mr Abadi's predecessor, have been accused of aiding IS.

IS control in Iraq and Syria