A RUSSIAN embassy employee was killed in Baghdad yesterday and four others were kidnapped by gunmen who stopped their car and fired on it, Russian and Iraqi officials said.
A Foreign Ministry spokesman in Moscow said the victims were all Russian nationals working at the embassy.
Iraqi Interior Ministry and police sources said gunmen in three cars blocked a road in the Mansour district and opened fire on the embassy vehicle.
It was yet another reminder of the security challenges that new Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki faces in delivering on his pledge to rein in guerrilla and insurgent violence.
Diplomats and other foreign nationals in Iraq have often been targeted for kidnappings and attacks since US-led forces invaded three years ago to topple Saddam Hussein.
A militant group kidnapped United Arab Emirates diplomat Naji al-Nuaimi in Baghdad last month.
A group calling itself Islam's Banner claimed responsibility, demanding the UAE withdraw its top diplomat in Iraq.
A UAE official said that no ransom had been paid for Nuaimi, who was freed after two weeks.
In August 2003, a truck bomb killed 17 Iraqis and wounded five Jordanian embassy staff outside the Jordanian embassy compound in the capital Baghdad. Later the same month, a truck bomb outside UN headquarters in Baghdad killed 22 people, including top UN envoy Sergio Vieira de Mello, a Brazilian.
Diplomats and embassy workers from Japan, Iran, Germany and the United States have also been killed in the past three years.
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