BAGHDAD, Jan 16: Sixty-five people, including students and teachers, were killed on Tuesday in the most devastating Iraq attack this year as a suicide bomber and a car bomb wreaked havoc outside a Baghdad university.

The massive bombing came just hours after the United Nations said that the raging violence left 34,452 people dead last year -- an average of 94 killings a day.

On Tuesday around 100 people were killed, mostly in Baghdad, but the day's deadliest attack and the biggest since the start of the year came from the twin blasts at the entrance of the renowned Mustansiriyah University in eastern Baghdad.

The explosions ripped through dozens of students, teachers and employees of the university as they were heading home at the end of the day, killing 65 people and wounding 138.

The blasts left a number of nearby cars completely burnt and many bodies charred in parked vehicles.

The dead and wounded were rushed to city hospitals in bed sheets, blankets, stretchers and a number of pick-up trucks.

Burnt corpses lay on the street, their mobile telephones ringing unanswered.

Founded in the 13th century, Mustansiriyah University was attended by Saddam Hussein's half-brother Barzan al-Tikriti, whose execution on Monday for crimes against humanity heightened sectarian tensions.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki blamed Saddam loyalists and Muslim extremists for the brutal attack.

“The horrendous crime was planned by a hopeless group of Saddamists and extremists,” he said in a statement.

“They have committed an ugly crime against innocent students and we vow the perpetrators will not go free.”

Just minutes before the university bombing, a group of gunmen driving two motorcycles and a car fired on shoppers in Baghdad's Al-Bounuk neighbourhood, killing 10 people.

The latest attacks came a few hours after the United Nations released a grim report on last year's casualties across Iraq.

Pointing to raging sectarian violence that has rocked Baghdad as the main cause of civilian deaths, the United Nations said that 34,452 Iraqis died around the country and another 36,685 were wounded last year.

“The situation is particularly grave in Baghdad, where most casualties and unidentified bodies that are daily recorded also bear signs of torture,” the report said.

The murders reached a peak in October, when 3,709 people were killed -- the highest since the US-led invasion in March 2003.

The Iraqi government has in the past disputed the UN's figures, calling them `exaggerated’.—AFP