At least four killed in car bomb in Baghdad-police

BAGHDAD, Jan 18 (Reuters): At least four people were killed and another 10 wounded today when a car bomb exploded in a busy street in central Baghdad, police sources said.

They said the car was parked on the side of the street at the entrance to a market.

There has been a surge of violence in the last two days at a time the Iraqi government is preparing to launch a major security crackdown in Baghdad.

At least 15 people were killed on Wednesday when a bomb ripped through a crowded market in Sadr City, a poor Shi'ite district in northeast Baghdad.

On Tuesday, bombers killed 70 people, many of them young women students, at a Baghdad university not far from Sadr City.