BAGHDAD: Attacks mostly targeting Sunni-majority areas of Iraq killed 13 people on Friday as the minority community shuttered countless mosques nationwide, complaining that security forces were failing to provide adequate protection.

The move follows a months-long surge in bloodshed, with the latest wave of violence leaving nearly 200 people dead in just the past week, that has forced Baghdad to appeal for international help in combatting militancy just months before its first general election in four years.