BAGHDAD — A powerful car bomb exploded outside a Shiite administration office in central Baghdad Monday, killing at least 22 people and wounding around 50 more, hospital and police sources said.



The blast targeted the Shiite Endowment office damaging its headquarters and a nearby health administration office, police said.



Monday’s attack comes amid a dispute between Iraq’s Shiite and Sunni religious endowments over control of a landmark shrine north of Baghdad.



Shiite authorities had sought to take over management of the Al-Askari shrine in Samarra, north of Baghdad and the site of an Al-Qaeda suicide attack in Feb. 2006 that ignited the worst of Iraq’s sectarian conflict. — Reuters