Baghdad - More than 60 soldiers and policemen, including 13 officers, have been arrested over twin bombings in central Baghdad that killed 153 people, a security spokesperson said on Thursday.
Those arrested were deployed in the Salhiyeh neighbourhood of the capital where the suicide attackers blasted government buildings on Sunday and wrought havoc in the streets, said Major General Qasim Atta, spokesperson for Baghdad operations command.
"The commission of inquiry into the double attacks on Sunday ordered the arrest of 13 officers of various ranks, and 50 members of the security forces responsible for the protection of Salhiyeh," he told AFP.
Among those arrested, said Atta, were six army officers and seven senior policemen, including the chief of police of Salhiyeh under whose jurisdiction falls the justice ministry, one of the attackers' targets.
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Also rounded up, he added, were the commanders of 15 security checkpoints in Salhiyeh.
The health ministry meanwhile said the toll from the attacks claimed by al-Qaeda stood at 153 people and more than 500 wounded.
"The final toll is 153 people dead," ministry spokesperson Sabah Abdullah said.
"It is difficult to know what proportion were men, women or children," he added, alluding to the terrible disfigurement wrought on the bodies of the dead by Sunday's bombings at the justice ministry and the Baghdad provincial governor's office.
Though violence has dropped across Iraq compared to last year, the death toll from the bombings comes close to matching the total number of people killed as a result of attacks in all of September, which was 203.
The investigation took on a political dimension Thursday, with parliament's defence and security committee calling on Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki to "detail the security situation and the challenges Iraq faces" in a question and answer session with parliament as soon as possible.
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