- BAGHDAD (Reuters) -- A senior
Iranian diplomat was shot dead close to Tehran's diplomatic mission in
Baghdad on Thursday, Iraqi police and diplomatic staff said.
-
- Iran's state television identified the dead man as the
first secretary of Iran's embassy, Khalil Naimi.
-
- "Khalil Naimi, first secretary of Iran's embassy
to Iraq, who was in his diplomatic car, was attacked by unknown people
and died immediately," the station's Baghdad reporter said.
-
- "The attack took place on Haifa street near the
Iranian embassy," the reporter added.
-
- A Reuters correspondent on the scene saw a car with at
least two bullet holes in it. A body was slumped in the vehicle, which
had smashed into a lamp-post after the shooting.
-
- "We have been told that he was driving his car to
go to the embassy and three men drove up and shot him," an Iranian
official said in Baghdad.
-
- An Iranian delegation has been in Iraq to try and help
mediate between the U.S.-led authorities and Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr.
-
- The United States has vowed to kill or capture Sadr and
destroy his militia, but both sides have said they are eager to avoid bloodshed.
-
- Under the rule of Saddam Hussein's Sunni Muslim-dominated
secular regime, some of Iraq's majority Shi'ite community sought exile
and developed close ties with Shi'ite-ruled Iran.
-
- Iran and Iraq fought a bloody eight-year war in the 1980s.
-
- Copyright © 2004 Reuters Limited. All rights reserved.
Republication or redistribution of Reuters content is expressly prohibited
without the prior written consent of Reuters. Reuters shall not be liable
for any errors or delays in the content, or for any actions taken in reliance
thereon.
-
- http://story.news.yahoo.com/news?tmpl=story&
- cid=574&e=4&u=/nm/iraq_iran_killing_dc
|
