BAGHDAD, Oct 27 (AFP) - A senior Iraqi diplomat was shot dead on Wednesday while walking home from Iraq`s foreign ministry by unknown attackers who at first tried to kidnap him, a ministry source said.
Qussay Mehdi "was accosted by four armed men who tried to kidnap him. He fought them off and they realised they could not take him so they fired two shots, one hit him in the head", the source said, on condition of anonymity.
Al-Jazeera television said earlier that it received a copy of a statement by the Islamic Army in Iraq claiming responsibility for the diplomat`s assassination in the Al-Aadhamiya district of Baghdad.
He was assassinated by "one of the army`s squads", the statement said.
Mehdi, Iraq`s charge d`affaires to the United Arab Emirates from June 2003 until last month, had been working at the ministry awaiting his next assignment, the foreign ministry source said.
A seasoned diplomat in his mid-to-late 50s, Mehdi had also worked at the foreign ministry during the former regime of Saddam Hussein.
His family, who still live in the United Arab Emirates, had heard about the murder and were due to return to Iraq, the ministry source said, adding that an investigation into the murder was underway.
Iraqi officials as well as members of the country`s new security forces have been prime targets of attack in an insurgency that has raged since last year`s US-led invasion that toppled Saddam.
In a step toward demonstrating its sovereignty following the US-led occupation that formally ended on June 28, Iraq`s interim government has appointed scores of ambassadors to embassies around the world.
10/27/2004 20:43 GMT - AFP