Gunmen kill eight workers in Iraq

Gunmen lined up 14 employees working at an electronics trading company in Baghdad this morning and shot them all, killing eight and wounding six, police said.

Iraqi politicians working on forming a national unity government postponed talks scheduled for today, saying they needed more time to consult their political blocs about what the security powers of the new government’s prime minister should be.

The motive of the attack at the al-Ibtikar trading company in the upscale Mansour neighbourhood was not immediately clear. According to survivors’ accounts to police, the assailants first asked for the company’s manager, who was not there, before firing on the employees.

The survivors said the assailants, some of whom were wearing police uniforms, identified themselves as intelligence agents from the Iraqi Interior Ministry.

Hundreds of Iraqis have been killed in sectarian violence and by death squads operating inside the Shiite-dominated Interior Ministry since the February 22 bombing of an important Shiite shrine in Samarra set off a wave of revenge attacks.

Usually, the victims are killed secretively, their bodies discovered hours or days later.

The assault today was the second to target a trading company in Mansour this week.

On Monday, gunmen wearing military uniforms and masks kidnapped 16 employees from the headquarters of the Saeed Import and Export Co.

Police said the assailants went through papers and computer files before leaving with their captives.

Another wave of kidnapping took place yesterday, when masked gunmen, many in military uniform, stormed into a currency exchange and two electronic stores in broad daylight, kidnapping 24 Iraqis and making off with tens of thousands of pounds.

The abductions occurred within a 30-minute period, and police were investigating whether they were linked.

In today’s attack, the gunmen arrived at al-Ibtikar facility in five black BMWs, police Lt. Maitham Abdul-Razzaq said. They burned parts of the facility, but didn’t appear to have taken any money, he said.

Those killed included five men and three women.

“All these operations have one aim: to freeze life in Iraq and sabotage the democratic process. They want to take us back to the dictatorship,” said Maj Gen Ahmed al-Khafaji, a deputy interior minister. He blamed al Qaida and said “We will work day and night to arrest them.

Also today, gunmen killed three staffers of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr in a drive-by shooting in west Baghdad, Abdul-Razzaq said. A mortar round slammed to earth just outside al-Sadr’s home in the holy city of Najaf earlier in the week.

The firebrand, anti-American leader, who holds great sway among poor Shiites in Baghdad, was at home but not hurt in the Sunday attack, according to an aide.

Gunmen also attacked a highway police patrol in west Baghdad today, killing one policeman and wounding four others, including a civilian, police said.

In south Baghdad, a sniper killed a policeman on patrol in the Dora neighbourhood, and a roadside bomb in the east killed one policeman and wounded five other people, police said.

Nearly 20 others, including a six-year-old girl, were wounded in the capital in roadside bombs, mortar attacks, gunfire and an explosion on a minibus, police said.

Gunmen also wounded an official from the Iraqi Central Bank, then later chased a car carrying five of the official’s guards and wounded them as well, police said.

There were also several attacks in Diyala province north of Baghdad. Gunmen killed two civilians and wounded another in a drive-by shooting in the town of Khalis, 50 miles north of the capital, police said.

A roadside bomb in front of an Iraqi soldier’s home outside the provincial capital of Baqouba wounded the soldier’s seven-year-old son, and another bomb targeted the house of a tribal sheikh in Baqouba but caused no casualties, police said.

North of Baghdad, an unmanned US Air Force Predator fired a Hellfire missile last night at three Iraqis planting a roadside bomb near Balad Air Base, killing all three, the Central Command said in a statement.

“This strike should send a message to our enemies that we’re watching you, and we will take action against you any time, day or night, if you continue to stand in the way of progress in Iraq,” Brig Gen Frank Gorenc, commander of the 332nd Air Expeditionary Wing at Balad, said in the statement.