Global General

Special

Newsmaker

Asia Pacific

America

Middle East

Europe

Africa

Four killed in car bombing north of Baghdad

(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-08-26 16:41

TIKRIT, Iraq -- Four people were killed and six others injured in a car bomb explosion near a government office in Tikrit, the capital city of Salahudin province on Tuesday, a provincial police source said.

"A booby-trapped car bomb detonated at about 07:45 a.m. (04:45 GMT) at the gate the provincial Health office in Tikrit, some 170 km north of Baghdad," Col. Hassan Ahmed, from the provincial police command, told Xinhua.

Related readings:  Suicide bomber kills 25 west of Baghdad  US helicopter crashes north of Baghdad  Suicide bomber kills 15 people in Baghdad  Car bomb kills three Shiite pilgrims in Baghdad

Two policemen guarding the office were among dead, Ahmed said.

Iraqi security forces rushed to the scene and cordoned off area while ambulances evacuated the victims to the city hospital, he added.

The attack apparently targeted Hassan Zen-al-Abdeen, the director of the health office, who was not at the office at the time of the attack, he said.

Zen-al-Abdeen is a member of the Supreme Iraqi Islamic Council (SIIC), headed by the Shiite cleric Abdul Aziz al-Hakim, who is also head of the Unified Iraqi Alliance (UIA), the leading Shiite bloc in the Iraqi parliament.

Violence persists in some Iraqi areas including Salahudin province despite a relative lull of violence as a result of a US military surge.