DAMASCUS, March 12 (Xinhua) -- The al-Qaida-linked Nusra Front claimed responsibility on Sunday for the deadly bombings that rocked the Syrian capital Damascus a day earlier and claimed the lives of 74 people.

Syrian security forces and locals gather at the scene of a twin bombing targeting Shiite pilgrims in Damascus' Old City on March 11, 2017, in one of the bloodiest attacks in the Syrian capital. (Xinhua/AFP Photo)

The announcement came a day after another rebel group called the Levant Swords said in a statement that the deadly bombings were its doing.

The rebels claim that the Shiite Iraqis were not pilgrims to shrines in Damascus, but fighters supporting the Syrian government forces against the six-year-old rebellion.

On Saturday, two bombings were carried out in swift succession near a cemetery in the Shaghour area in the old part of Damascus.

The first explosion was carried out through an explosive device that went off near a gathering of buses carrying Shiite Iraqi visitors to the Bab al-Saghir cemetery to visit Shiite shrines, as part of Shiite pilgrim practices.

After the first explosion, passengers from nine buses gathered to see what had happened, when a suicide bomber wearing a bomb vest detonated himself among the crowds, killing 74 of them and wounding nearly 100 others, according to the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights.