Ten people were killed in a car bombing near the oil ministry in Baghdad in one of a spate of attacks on Thursday, adding to fears of spiralling violence in the run-up to the October 15 referendum on Iraq’s new Constitution. The bombings and shootings came a day after a bomb attack in the town of Hilla, south of Baghdad, killed 25 people.

Iraqi gunmen on Monday murdered five teachers and a driver at a primary school as United States forces released more than 500 prisoners from the notorious Abu Ghraib jail. In the school attack, 10 gunmen dressed as police officers dragged the teachers from their classrooms, took them to an empty classroom and shot them, police said.

At least 647 people were killed and 301 injured on Wednesday in a stampede in Baghdad on a bridge near a Shi’ite shrine where tens of thousands of the faithful were gathered, a security official said. Many of the dead drowned after falling off the bridge in a surge of panic triggered by rumours there were suicide bombers in the crowd.

Three car bombs exploded just minutes apart at a busy Baghdad bus station and a nearby hospital during morning rush hour on Wednesday, ripping through buses and killing at least 43 people. Iraqi authorities said the bombings were aimed at terrorising people and triggering a collapse of the government.

The Iraqi capital was hit by twin suicide car bombs on Monday that killed at least eight people as Australian Prime Minister John Howard, a top United States ally, made a surprise visit to Baghdad. Sunni Arabs also on Monday ended their boycott of talks on drawing up a post-Saddam Hussein Constitution.

Three Sunnis working on the draft of Iraq’s new Constitution were gunned down in Baghdad on Tuesday, rattling hopes expressed earlier in the day that the new charter might be completed ahead of schedule. At least 31 people were killed on Tuesday in Iraq violence, police and military officials said.