At least 23 people have been killed in a fresh wave of bomb attacks in the Iraqi capital, amid warnings the country is on the brink of civil war.
The worst death toll was in a blast near a security checkpoint that killed at least 20 people and wounded 40.
Sectarian slaughter was triggered last week by the destruction of an important Shia shrine in the city of Samarra.
A US military intelligence chief has warned that further violence could have a "significant impact" on the country.
"We're in a very tenuous situation right now I believe," Lieut Gen Michael Myers told the Senate Armed Services Committee in Washington.
"I think that more violence, were it to occur, were it to be stimulated by Al-Qaeda in Iraq, would have a very significant impact on the situation in Iraq," he said.
Repeat attack
On Tuesday at least 60 people were killed in a surge of bomb attacks a day after the authorities lifted a daytime curfew that had been imposed to stem the killing.
As relatives of those killed arrived at the city mortuary to collect their bodies for burial, there were at least three further explosions across Baghdad.
The bloody attack on a checkpoint in the eastern Jadida district - a mainly Shia neighbourhood - was a few hundred meters (yards) from the scene of one of Tuesday's bombings.
Within an hour, a car bomb near Baghdad's central bus station killed at least three people. It was apparently timed to hit a police patrol, although the casualties were civilians. A third bomb also exploded in the east of the city, but without causing any casualties.
Meanwhile south of Baghdad, three civilians died when mortar rounds slammed into houses, police said.
(BBC)
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