Iraq

Gunmen kill Iraqi official

BAGHDAD - Gunmen firing from a car killed Iraq's deputy foreign minister Saturday in the first assassination of a senior official since the interim government was announced this month. Iraqi authorities blamed Saddam Hussein loyalists.

Bassam Salih Kubba, 60, was Iraq's most senior career diplomat and was slated to stay on in the new administration that takes over after June 30 from the U.S.-led occupation authority.

Kubba was mortally wounded when gunmen drove up behind his car in the city's Azimiyah district and fired, Foreign Ministry spokesman Thamir al-Adhami said.

The Foreign Ministry said the attack "bears all the hallmarks of leftover supporters of Saddam Hussein's evil regime."

Also, a Lebanese Foreign Ministry official said a Lebanese construction worker, Hussein Ali Alyan, had been shot dead by kidnappers and his body found Saturday near Fallujah.

The official, Mohammed Issa, said Alyan was among three Lebanese who had been abducted by Iraq, but he did not say when. One was freed and the other is missing.

More than 40 people from several countries have been abducted in Iraq since April - although many of them have been released or freed by coalition soldiers.

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