Iraq hit by fresh sectarian bloodshed

Gunmen killed 21 people, including a dozen students, after they dragged them off buses north-east of Baghdad. The gunmen spared four Sunni Arabs in one of the worst sectarian atrocities in recent weeks.

In another outbreak of sectarian violence, a firefight broke out after police surrounded a Sunni Arab mosque in oil-rich southern Basra, leaving at least nine people dead in another blow to efforts by Iraq’s prime minister to curb sectarian violence in Iraq’s second largest city.