WORLD NEWS

BAGHDAD: Massive bombs hit apartment buildings across Baghdad on Tuesday, killing at least 34 people and wounding more than 100 in the latest sign that Iraq's fragile security could dissolve in the chaos of the country's unresolved election.

Maj. Gen. Qassim al-Moussawi, an Iraqi military spokesman for Baghdad's operations command center, said the attackers detonated seven blasts across the capital, using homemade bombs and, in one case, a car packed with explosives.

``There are casualties, and we are counting them right now with the Health Ministry,'' al-Moussawi said. Police and medical officials said the death toll was at least 34,and that women and children were among the dead. They spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not allowed to release information publicly.

The explosions started at about 9:30 a.m. at a residential building in the Shula area of northwest Baghdad That was followed by a car bomb about a mile away in an intersection, which damaged nearby buildings, according to police and hospital officials.

A few minutes later, at 9:45 a.m. a bomb left in a plastic bag exploded at a restaurant in the Allawi district downtown, near the government's Culture Ministry.