HILLA, Iraq, Nov. 24 (UPI) -- At least 57 people were killed Thursday when a truck bomb exploded near buses parked at a Hilla, Iraq, filling station, Iraq's Joint Operation Command said.
The victims aboard the crowded buses were Shiite pilgrims, largely Iranian nationals, traveling home from Iraq after a religious observance. The explosion occurred in the on a highway between Babel and Al-Qadisiyyah in the suburbs of Hilla, about 75 miles southeast of Baghdad.