Iraqi authorities arrest 4 for Mosul market bombing

By Ahmed Qassem and Sarhad Shaker

BAGHDAD (AA) - Iraqi authorities on Thursday arrested four people suspected of having carried out a terrorist attack in Mosul following the city’s recapture last year from the Daesh terrorist group.

“Four wanted individuals were arrested and charged with blowing up a market in Mosul’s eastern Al-Muthanna district in June of last year, causing deaths and injuries,” Captain Jawad Mohamed al-Makhzoumi of the National Security Service (NSS) in Nineveh province (of which Mosul is regional capital) said.

“Initial confessions made by the defendants indicate that they are in fact the culprits and that they are Daesh members,” he added.

In a related development Thursday, Iraqi authorities found the dead body of an unidentified individual in Mosul’s western Mansour district.

“The body is that of a man who sustained gunshot wounds to his head, chest and abdomen,” NSS Captain Mustafa Khalil Ibrahimi told Anadolu Agency, noting that the body also appeared to bear signs of torture.

While no group has claimed responsibility for the man’s abduction, the Iraqi authorities typically blame such acts of violence on Daesh.

Late last year, officials in Baghdad declared that Daesh's military presence in Iraq had been all but destroyed.

It appears the notorious terrorist group, however, still maintains “sleeper cells” in several parts of the country, including the northern Nineveh province.