At least seven killed in Iraq car bomb blasts

A series of car bombs in three different Iraqi cities today left at least seven people dead and dozens wounded.

In the ancient city of Tal Afar, a suicide car bomber drove up to a busy vegetable market and detonated his explosives, killing at least two shoppers and wounding seven others, said police Brig. Abdul-Hamid Khalaf.

Tal Afar, 260 miles north-west of Baghdad, has been singled out by US President George Bush as a success story for American and Iraqi forces in the drive to quell the insurgency.

A parked car bomb exploded near a medical facility in the city of Khalis, killing two bystanders and wounding at least 23 others, police said. Khalis is 50 miles north of Baghdad.

The third car bomb exploded in Baghdad, targeting a police patrol in the northern district of Wazziriyah.

The blast killed one policeman and two civilians, and wounded four others.

Also in Baghdad, gunmen hunted down three government employees and shot them dead on their way to work.

An internal affairs officer at the Interior Ministry was killed by men in two cars while leaving his house in Amil in western Baghdad, and a Housing Ministry employee was killed as he drove to work in the same neighbourhood, police said.

In northern Baghdad, gunmen shot down an Oil Ministry worker at a bus stop.

The motives for the targeted attacks were not known.

Gunmen in the eastern neighbourhood of Baladiyat kidnapped a policeman as he was leaving his house.

Northeast of Baghdad, a roadside bomb in the city of Baqouba targeted a convoy carrying the deputy of the governor of Diyala province, wounding two of his guards.

Two rockets hit the British military base at the Basra airport complex about 3am local time, but there were no damages or casualties.

In Muqdadiyah, about 60 miles north of Baghdad, mortar rounds struck a police station, wounding three policemen.