BAGHDAD: At least 36 Iraqi police officers and cadets were killed and 72 others wounded on Tuesday when two women suicide bombers blew themselves up in a Baghdad police academy classroom, police said.
Initial reports from the US military had said at least 27 police officers and academy students were killed and another 32 wounded in the attack, which comes just nine days before Iraq holds parliamentary elections.
"Two suicide bombers attacked an Iraqi police academy in east Baghdad around 12:45 pm (1515 IST)," the military said in a statement.
"Two females, each wearing a suicide vest, walked into a classroom at the academy and detonated in the midst of students," it added.
It remains unclear how the two women were able to breach heavy security in place around the academy, where roads have been sealed off by Iraqi police in a bid to
prevent such bombings.
Women, however, are not always subject to the same stringent security checks as men in largely conservative Iraq where it is deemed inappropriate for male guards to frisk women or girls.
The deadly blast came after 19 Iraqi soldiers were killed in an ambush just north of the Sunni Muslim flashpoint town of Baquba on Saturday.
Al-Qaeda claims Baghdad police attack
Al-Qaeda claimed responsibility for Tuesday's twin suicide bomb attack on a Baghdad police academy, according to an Internet statement whose authenticity could not be verified.
