BAGHDAD: Attacks in Baghdad and across central Iraq, including five car bombs, killed at least 10 people on Tuesday amid a surge in violence, as parliamentary elections loom next month.

The blasts, which also left more than 50 people wounded, come with Iraq suffering its worst level of violence since 2008, when the country was emerging from brutal sectarian violence between Sunni and Shiite Muslims.

The surge in unrest has been driven principally by discontent among Iraq’s Sunni Arab minority and by the civil war in neighboring Syria, and has killed more than 2,000 people already this year, according to an AFP tally.