BAGHDAD, March 11: Insurgent attacks claimed another 58 Iraqi lives on Sunday, including 31 Shia pilgrims killed in a car bomb attack on a convoy returning from Karbala.

The latest deadly blasts came a day after Iraq urged its neighbours to stop supplying weapons and cash to extremist militants, at peace talks which saw a rare face-to-face clash between the United States and Iran.

US forces rounded up 15 “suspected terrorists” in various raids, but still the carnage continued, with insurgents targeting Shia pilgrims, labourers and the offices of a mainstream Sunni political party.

A car bomb attack in Baghdad's downtown Karrada district killed 31 Shia devotees and wounded 25 more as their convoy returned from Karbala, which on Saturday hosted millions of pilgrims for the Arbaeen.

Of the wounded, five were in critical condition, according to a medic at Baghdad's Ibn Nafis hospital.

Hundreds of thousands of pilgrims were on the road, making their homeward journey on foot or in cars and buses. Last week almost 200 were killed in sectarian attacks by Sunni insurgents.

Ten commuters were killed and eight wounded when a suicide bomber detonated explosives strapped to his body on board a minibus as it passed near Baghdad's Mustansiriyah University, a frequent target of extremists.

In another attack, five construction workers were killed and 10 wounded when their bus hit a roadside bomb near Baladruz, 100 kilometres (60 miles) northeast of Baghdad, in the violent province of Diyala, police said.

Further north in Mosul, a bomb ripped through the office of the Islamic Party, killing four people, said police Brigadier General Mohammed al-Wagga.

Party official Mohammed Shakir al-Ghanam said three of the victims were guards and the fourth a suicide bomber. Police could not confirm this.

Elsewhere eight more people were killed.

Such apparently sectarian attacks, which have claimed tens of thousands of lives, were the focus of Saturday's summit in Baghdad of Iraq's neighbours and officials from the five permanent UN Security Council members.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki begged his neighbours to cut off cross-border shipments of cash and weapons to extremist groups, squeezing a commitment from his guests that they would help end the violence.

But aside from a bland pledge to “fight terrorism and enhance security”, the parties remained far apart, with the United States delegation accusing Iran of arms smuggling and Tehran demanding a US military withdrawal from Iraq.

In an interview with US television, US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad said he spoke with the Iranian envoy for a few minutes at the opening of the conference.

While there were no “substantive” direct talks, Khalilzad said he raised US allegations that Iran was supplying arms and other support to Iraqi militias.

“Will they stop supplying arms and training and money to militias and other unauthorised groups?” Khalilzad asked, rhetorically.—AFP