BAGHDAD — A suicide bomber driving a pickup loaded with explosives struck a bustling market in Baghdad Monday, killing at least 36 people in an attack claimed by the Islamic State group hours after President Francois Hollande of France arrived in the Iraqi capital.
The bomb went off in a fruit and vegetable market packed with day laborers, a police officer said, adding that another 52 were wounded.
During a press conference with Hollande, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi said the bomber pretended to be a man seeking to hire day laborers. Once the workers gathered around, he detonated the vehicle.
ISIS claimed the attack in a statement circulated on a militant website often used by the extremists.
It was the third ISIS-claimed attack in as many days in and around Baghdad, underscoring the lingering threat posed by the group, despite setbacks elsewhere in the country over the past year, including in and around the northern city of Mosul.
The attack took place in Sadr City, a vast Shi’ite district in eastern Baghdad that has been repeatedly targeted by Sunni extremists since the 2003 US-led invasion of Iraq.
Shi’ite militiamen loyal to Moqtada al-Sadr, the firebrand cleric for whose family the neighborhood is named, were seen evacuating bodies in their trucks before ambulances arrived. Dead bodies were scattered across the bloody pavement alongside fruit, vegetables, and laborers’ shovels and axes. A minibus filled with dead passengers was on fire.
Asaad Hashim, an owner of a mobile phone store nearby, described how the laborers pushed and shoved around the bomber’s vehicle, trying to get hired.
‘‘Then a big boom came, sending them up into the air,’’ said the 28-year-old, who suffered shrapnel wounds to his right hand. He blamed ‘‘the most ineffective security forces in the world’’ for failing to prevent the attack.
An angry crowd cursed the government, even after a representative of al-Sadr tried to calm them. Late last month, Iraqi authorities started removing some of the security checkpoints in Baghdad in a bid to ease traffic for the capital’s 6 million residents.
Several smaller bombings elsewhere in the city on Monday killed another 20 civilians and wounded at least 70, according to medics and police.
Hollande, meanwhile, met with al-Abadi and President Fuad Masum and later traveled to the self-governing northern Kurdish region to meet with French troops. He pledged support for displaced Iraqis return to Mosul, where Iraqi forces are waging an offensive against ISIS. France is part of the US-led coalition to fight ISIS after the extremist group seized large areas in Iraq and Syria. France has suffered multiple attacks claimed by the extremist group.
Since the Mosul operation started on Oct. 17, Iraqi forces have seized about a quarter of the city.
