Islamic State claims suicide bombs as it defies U.S. strikes

Islamic State claimed responsibility for a triple suicide bombing in northern Iraq that killed at least 58 people as militants defied U.S.-led airstrikes to stage attacks across Iraq and Syria.

The group said on a jihadist website that three foreign fighters carried out the attacks yesterday in Qara Tappah in the ethnically mixed province of Diyala, 75 miles north of Baghdad.

A roadside bomb also killed the police chief of the western Iraqi city of Ramadi, where security forces are struggling to repel militant attacks.

Islamic State has so far resisted efforts by the Iraqi military to wrest back control of Sunni areas of the country, while continuing its own offensive in Iraq and neighboring Syria. President Barack Obama's senior military adviser warned that militants were blending with Sunni populations in communities near Baghdad, increasing the likelihood of attacks on the Iraqi capital.

"I have no doubt there will be days when they use indirect fire into Baghdad," the adviser, Joint Chiefs Chairman General Martin Dempsey, said in an interview yesterday with "This Week" on ABC. Indirect fire can refer to use of mortars or artillery fire.

Islamic State has already carried out attacks in the capital. The group claimed responsibility for Oct. 11 suicide strikes that targeted Shiite neighborhoods in Baghdad, according to a statement posted yesterday on a jihadist website. The suicide car bombs killed more than 43 people in the Shula and Kadhimiya districts of the capital, the pro-government al- Sumaria television channel reported. The attack wounded 91 people, it said.

International efforts against Islamic State have intensified as militants threaten to capture Ramadi in Iraq and the northern Syrian town of Kobani. Kurdish forces, backed by Yezidi fighters and tribal militants, on Oct. 11 started an offensive to retake the town of Sinjar in Iraq's north, the al- Mada news agency reported, citing security officials.

As part of an international effort to improve the capability of Iraq's forces, the U.K. sent a "small specialist team" of soldiers to Iraq to train Kurdish forces how to use heavy machine guns Britain supplied to them last month, the Press Association said, citing the Ministry of Defence.

Iraqis stand at the site of a car bomb attack in Baghdad, on Oct. 9, 2014.