Suicide Bomber Attacks Iraqi Governor

A suicide car bomber rammed into a convoy of U.S. and Iraqi vehicles accompanying the governor of volatile Al Anbar province through the city of Ramadi on Tuesday, leaving at least three dead, police and hospital officials in the provincial capital said.

Gov. Mamoun Sami Rasheed’s condition was unknown.

The Ramadi suicide bomber killed at least three Iraqi civilians, and others were believed to be trapped inside several burning vehicles, police said. U.S. forces quickly cordoned off the area.

Witnesses claimed there were U.S. casualties, but there was no official confirmation. Several civilians were killed or injured by gunfire, witnesses said.

Meanwhile, German authorities reported Tuesday that two engineers held hostage by an unknown group since January had been released. In a videotape aired on Al Jazeera television three months ago, kidnappers threatened to kill Rene Braeunlich and Thomas Nitzschke if Berlin did not close its embassy in Iraq and withdraw all German companies from the country.

Violence took the lives of at least 30 others in Iraq, including at least one U.S. soldier reported killed Monday night by a roadside bomb south of Baghdad.

Iraqi police and witnesses reported that another U.S. soldier was killed by a sniper north of Baghdad in the Mashahidah area. The military has not confirmed the death.

U.S.-led forces said they killed 10 suspected insurgents, three wearing suicide vests, early today during a raid on a house near Balad. No U.S. soldiers were injured, a news release said.

A bomb placed in a bus in Baghdad killed at least two Iraqis and injured five. Roadside bombs in the capital killed at least two and injured one.

Police found the body of a member of the Anbar Tribal Council, a Sunni political group, in his car in Baghdad. A teacher and seven other civilians were also killed in six separate drive-by shooting incidents around the capital.

A stray mortar round killed an Iraqi southwest of Baghdad. In Baqubah, northeast of the capital, police officers said they mistakenly shot up a minibus, killing two civilians and injuring two.

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Special correspondents in Baghdad, Baqubah and Ramadi contributed to this report.