A car bomb exploded late Wednesday outside the home of a pro-American tribal leader in Ramadi (about 100 kilometers west of Baghdad), killing at least seven people, according to hospital officials. A policeman said he saw six bodies.
Eyewitnesses said they believed it was a suicide attack.
"A car filled with explosives came fast. The driver blew himself up inside the car," a resident said.
The explosion took place at about 9:15 p.m. near the house of Sheikh Amer Ali Suleiman, according to his cousin Yasser Ali. Ali told AFP that Suleiman was not wounded but at least one child was killed and other people were injured.
Suleiman is a leader of the Duleim tribe, one of the largest Sunni Muslim tribes in Iraq. As a member of the city council, he is close to the Americans.
Also in Ramadi, witnesses said local tribal leader Mahmoud Jarbou, known for his cooperation with the Americans, was shot dead late Wednesday.
The son of the regional police chief Jadan al-Alwani was badly wounded in an attack with machineguns and a hand grenade on the family home, reports said Thursday.
Meanwhile, the US-led occupation offered a bounty of up to 10 million dollars for Saddam Hussein's deputy Izzat Ibrahim and revealed that two homes belonging to him were among the targets hit in massive aerial bombardments around Iraq earlier this week.
"Information leading to the capture of Izzat Ibrahim al-Duri is worth up to 10 million dollars," said wanted posters in Arabic and English released to publish the new bounty on his head.
The former vice-president of Iraq is the highest-ranking official of the old regime still at large apart from Saddam himself.
Ibrahim was recently accused by the occupation of playing a leading role in the attacks targeting its troops.
"It is clear that we have persuasive evidence linking him to anti-coalition activities," a military spokesman Brigadier General Mark Kimmitt said at a press briefing. (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
