A senior Iraqi Army general and five other people were killed and more than 20 people wounded in several bombings and gun attacks across the country, security officials said.
Brigadier General Mohammed Hamid Juwad, a member of the Army's general staff, was killed by a "sticky bomb" placed under his car in the Saidiya district of southern Baghdad yesterday, said an interior ministry source.
In northern Iraq, twin roadside bombs targeting anti-Qaeda militiamen in a former insurgent stronghold killed three people and wounded 22, including seven militia fighters, the police said.
A first bomb targeted a local leader of the Sahwa militia, known in the US army as the "Sons of Iraq," in the town of Sharqat, in Salaheddin province north of Baghdad, and the second exploded when a crowd gathered at the scene.
"The first roadside bomb targeted a convoy transporting Abu Arkan al-Juburi, a Sahwa leader in Sharqat," said police Colonel Mijbil Hassan al-Juburi.
"He was wounded, as were six other Sahwa members. when people gathered to see what had happened, a second roadside bomb exploded. Three people were killed, and 15 others wounded."
Recruited by the US military among Sunni Arab tribesmen and former insurgents, the Sahwa (Awakening) militia played a key role in curbing Sunni-Shiite sectarian bloodshed which claimed thousands of lives in 2006-2007.
In Bohruz, in the restive Diyala province of northeast Iraq, a state oil company employee was shot dead, security officials said.
Police Lieutenant Colonel Ali Mohammed was seriously wounded in the head while driving in the Mansur district and a public works ministry official was gunned down in his car in Khadra, in gun attacks in west Baghdad, they said.