Car bomb blast kills seven in Iraq
(Agencies)
Updated: 2004-08-09 21:57

A suicide car bomb exploded northeast of the Iraqi capital on Monday, an apparent attempt to assassinate a deputy governor. He was wounded, officials said, while seven people were killed.

Iraqi police stand guard next to a crater and a damaged vehicle at the site of a car bomb blast in Balad Ruz some 100 kms northeast of Baghdad, Iraq, Monday Aug. 9, 2004. The blast killed at least seven police officers in an apparent attempt to assassinate a deputy governor. [AP]

The deputy governor of Diyala province, Aqil Hamid al-Adili, was in stable condition and was being treated at a U.S.-led coalition medical facility, military spokesman Maj. Neal O'Brien said.

"This was a suicide attack with a booby-trapped car," Police Brig. Daoud Mahmoud Mahmoud said. "We are busy moving casualties to the hospital."

O'Brien said a white station wagon laden with explosives blew up outside al-Adili's home. Citing police reports, he said seven Iraqi policemen were killed.

At least 17 people were also wounded in the blast, including police and passers-by, Mahmoud said.

A young Iraqi boy accompanies militiamen allied to radical Iraqi Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al Sadr, as they patrol the city of Najaf, August 9, 2004. [AP]

Several police were deployed in two vehicles outside the residence to protect al-Adili, who was home at the time.

The blast shattered the windows of al-Adili's house, blew doors off their hinges and lightly injured the deputy governor's 9-year-old son, Mahmoud said.

Guerrillas waging a yearlong insurgency in Iraq have repeatedly used car bombs to attack top officials of the interim government, Iraqi security forces and American troops.

Qaiser Hamid, a hospital official in the area, said his hospital had received two of the dead. It was not immediately clear whether they were police or civilians.

O'Brien said the blast occurred about 7:30 a.m. He said troops from the U.S. Army 1st Infantry Division's 30th Brigade Combat Team went to the scene of the attack to investigate and help evacuate casualties.

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