BAGHDAD: Masked gunmen ambushed a bus yesterday carrying election workers in southern Iraq, killing two of them, including an official known for resisting interference by Shiite religious extremists, authorities said.
A third election employee was wounded in the attack, which occurred as the bus passed through the Abu Al-Khasib area south of Basra, police and election officials said. The dead included the head of a local government committee preparing for provincial elections, Maath Wahab, and his deputy, Jassim Mohammed, according to Hazim Al-Rubaie, director of Basra electoral committee.
No group claimed responsibility and no arrests have been made. But local officials said Wahab was known for resisting interference in the electoral process by Shiite religious extremists.
The officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they feared for their own safety.Provincial elections are expected late this year and will likely redistribute power among Iraq’s political and ethnic groups.
No date has been set because legislation has been stalled in the national Parliament, but preparations have begun nationwide. Control of polling places would enable parties to manipulate the results. Voters will select members of the provincial councils in Iraq’s 18 provinces.
Elsewhere yesterday, a roadside bomb exploded in the northern city of Mosul as a convoy carrying the city’s mayor sped past, police said. The mayor escaped injury but a bodyguard was injured. US-backed Iraqi troops have been seeking for months to rid Mosul of Al-Qaeda and other Sunni militant groups.
In Baghdad, mourners in the city’s Azamiyah district fired weapons in the air in a display of grief during a funeral for Farooq Al-Obeidi, deputy head of a group of US-allied Sunni fighters who was killed by a suicide bomber.
Nine other people were killed and at least 20 were wounded in Sunday night’s blast, Iraqi officials said. They declined to be identified because they weren’t authorized to release the information.
