Baghdad car bomb kills at least 15, says ministry official

A car bombing on Monday evening in the Iraqi capital Baghdad killed at least 15 people and wounded 33, an interior ministry official told AFP.

The blast happened at around 7:00 pm (1600 GMT) in the busy business district of Hay al-Amel in the west of the city, he said.

There was no immediate claim of responsibility for the explosion, which bore all the hallmarks of a suicide attack by the Islamic State group.

The radical militant group is under assault in both Iraq - in the country's second city Mosul which IS seized in June 2014 - and in neighbouring Syria.

In that year, IS took vast swathes of Iraqi territory north and west of the capital.

Iraqi government forces backed by the US-led international coalition have since retaken many cities, including Tikrit.

But as IS has lost ground in Iraq, it has also retained the ability to stage regular attacks there.