A series of car bombings across Baghdad killed 40 people and injured more than 150 on Monday, security officials said, in the latest episode of sectarian violence in the country, dpa reported.
Most of the blasts targeted Shiite-dominated neighbourhoods in the Iraqi capital and hit market areas. There has been a sharp rise in attacks in recent months in Iraq, stoking fears of a return to the sectarian violence that pushed the country to the brink of civil war in 2006-07.
The United States condemned the wave of car bombings. State Department spokeswoman Jen Psaki said the attacks were "detestable and disgraceful" and expose the nature of the people who committed them.
The latest attacks came a day after a suicide bomber blew himself up at a funeral in the southern Shiite city of Hilla, killing at least 25 people.
Psaki said the US would stand with the Iraqi people against the violence "and in our commitment to support efforts to bring those responsible for these attacks to justice."