Gunmen kill academic

2004-07-31 15:52

Baghdad, Iraq - Gunmen shot dead the head of a state-run teacher's institute as he left a mosque after prayers, police said on Saturday, an attack in apparent retribution for his refusal to stop working for Iraqi authorities.

Militants had previously warned Ismail al-Kilabi, the head of the Mahmoudiyah Teachers Institute, 32 kilometres south of Baghdad, to quit his job following the transfer of power from US occupation forces to the interim government, police Lt Ala'a Hussein said.

He had refused and gunmen ambushed and killed him after he left an evening prayer service Friday at a mosque, Hussein said.

Iraqi militants have increasingly targeted police and other Iraqi officials they see as collaborators with coalition forces as part of their 15-month-old insurgency.

Early on Saturday, two mortars exploded in a garden in northern Baghdad's Shalchia suburb, injuring two sleeping children, including a 13-year-old girl, hospital official Dr Taleb Mustafa said.

Also on Saturday, the US military said that 20 Iraqi fighters were killed in fierce fighting between marines, backed by Iraqi security forces, and insurgents between 19:30 on Thursday and 01:00 on Friday in the city of Fallujah.

Hospital officials had previously said at least 13 were killed and 14 wounded. Many of those wounded, including at least one child, appeared to be civilians injured in US airstrikes, hospital officials said.

- AP