At least nine people have lost their lives and ten others sustained injuries in a bomb explosion that ripped through a popular market in Tikrit, located in Iraq's northern Salahuddin province, Press TV reported.
The terrorist attack on a crowded street targeted Lieutenant Colonel Ahmed Subhi al-Fahal, who was conducting a patrol in the vicinity of al-Atibaa market, in central Tikrit, an Iraqi police source told Aswat al-Iraq news agency on condition of anonymity.
He added that Fahal -- the commander of the Salahuddin riot police -- alongside four of his bodyguards, as well as four civilians were killed in the incident. Ten people, among them two police officers, were wounded in the bombing in Tikrit, situated 140 km (87 miles) northwest of Baghdad on the Tigris river.
Security forces cordoned off the area after the attack and launched an investigation to look into the motive behind the incident. Ambulances and civilian cars, meanwhile, evacuated the wounded to a nearby hospital for medical treatment.
Explosions, rampant throughout the war-battered Iraq, claim civilian lives and leave many wounded almost daily in the country.