Your trusted source

Clashes with Islamic State militants killed a senior Kurdish military commander and eight of his fighters just outside the disputed northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Friday, officials said, The Associated Press reported.

Attacks elsewhere killed 27 people, with twin bombs hitting a crowded market in Baghdad and a suicide bomber targeting pro-government Shiite militiamen who were manning a checkpoint outside a city north of the Iraqi capital.

The casualties near the oil-rich Kirkuk were a heavy setback for the Iraqi Kurds, who have been at the forefront of the battle against the Islamic State group, which has captured a third of both Iraq and Syria in its blitz last year.

Also Friday, a car bomb exploded outside an empty, closed hotel near Kirkuk's police headquarters, wounding two people. Both the Kurdish troops and the city's security force have been trying to rout the IS group from Kirkuk, about 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Baghdad.

After the car bombing, three gunmen took positions inside the hotel, located in the city center, triggering a firefight with the Kurds and the police.

Associated Press footage from the scene showed members of the Kurdish troops and the local police firing at the Qassir Hotel in Kirkuk and then storming it. Officials later said the gunmen were all killed.

The Kurdish Brig. Gen. Shirko Fatih and eight Kurdish fighters died in clashes south of the city earlier in the day, after the IS militants attacked the peshmerga fighters' positions, said Brig. Khatab Omar.