Al Jazeera reports: Fresh attacks in Iraq, including car bombs in Baghdad, have killed at least 19 people, including police officers, amid a surge of violence that has left 160 dead in a week and increased fears of all-out sectarian conflict.

On Thursday morning, a car bomb in northeast Baghdad killed four people and wounded a dozen more, while another vehicle packed with explosives went off in the centre of the capital, leaving two dead and 10 wounded, officials said.

Al Jazeera’s Jane Arraf, reporting from Baghdad, said that at least eight policemen were killed in the northern city of Mosul after unknown gunmen opened fire on local officers.

“There has not been a claim of responsibility for the attack. But in the past an al-Qaeda front group has claimed responsility for attacks on Shia areas and security forces, which they see as illegitimate,” she said.

Two border policemen were also ambushed along the main Iraq-Jordan highway and shot dead.

The latest violence came a day after multiple bomb blasts struck two neighbourhoods in the Iraqi capital, killing at least 28 people, including several members of a wedding party.