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BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP) — Officials say nearly a dozen apparently coordinated car bombs and a shooting across Iraq have killed at least 32 and wounded scores.

Officials say the car bombs targeting Shiite-majority areas were the cause of most of the casualties. The shooting happened near the northern city of Mosul when gunmen attacked police guarding a remote stretch of an oil pipeline.

Violence has spiked sharply in Iraq in recent months, with the death toll rising to levels not seen since 2008. Nearly 2,000 have been killed since the start of April.

The extended wave of attacks is raising fears of a return to widespread sectarian killing a decade after the U.S.-led invasion.

   BAGHDAD (AP) — Iraqi officials say at least 14 people have been killed in clashes between Sunni protesters and security forces in a northern Sunni town.

   Sheikh Abdullah Sami al-Asi, a Sunni provincial official from the town of Hawija, says the fighting began early on Tuesday morning when security forces entered the protest area in the town and tried to make arrests.

   Provincial health director Sidiq Omar Rasool says there are at least 14 protesters killed. He says the clashes also wounded more than 50 demonstrators and six members of Iraqi security forces.

   Hawija is 240 kilometers (160 miles) north of Baghdad.

   A United Nations spokeswoman in Iraq, Eliana Nabaa, confirmed that there are multiple casualties. She urged both sides to immediately lay down their weapons.