Gunmen kill aide to Iraq's most influential cleric

Gunmen killed an aide to Iraq’s most influential Shiite cleric and two bodyguards in a drive-by shooting outside a Baghdad mosque today – an attack likely to stoke tensions between the Shiite majority and the Sunni minority, officials said.

Elsewhere in the capital, a car bomb exploded near a checkpoint outside offices of Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari’s Islamic Dawa Party, killing one person and injuring at least four more, officials said. Al-Jaafari was not there at the time, party official Ayad al-Nedawi said.