ANKARA, Dec 18 (AFP) - Attackers made four Turkish security guards get out of cars they were travelling in through Iraq to Baghdad, machine-gunned them and decapitated one, an official in the Iraqi town of Mosul was quoted Saturday as saying.
The description followed confirmation by the foreign ministry in Ankara that Turkish embassy bodyguards had died in an attack.
"According to information obtained by our embassy in Baghdad, there have been casualties in the incident ... We are very upset that some personnel were killed," a statement said.
"Armed men made the passengers get out of the cars, lie on the ground, machine-gunned them and cut off the head off one of them," Muhammet Tahir, an official of the Turkmen Front in Mosul, was quoted as telling the Turkish press agency DHA.
Tahir was quoted by the website of the television station CNN-Turk as saying the victims had been travelling from the Turkish-Iraqi border post at Habur, when the convoy was attacked near Mosul, in the district of Yarmuk.
"We wanted to get to the scene, but the Americans sealed it off," Tahir said. "But we saw four bodies, including one that was decapitated."
"We investigated and found out that they were Turks, but it hasn't been confirmed," the official added.
One of the guards and a driver survived the attack and returned to Turkey, while two other guards made it safely to the embassy in Baghdad, the foreign ministry said.
"Our authorities are investigating the matter and trying to obtain more information from the Iraqi interim government and local officials," it added.
The CNN-Turk website said one of the victims was a police inspector and the other three police officers.
About 70 Turkish nationals, mainly truck drivers, have so far been killed in Iraq since the US-led invasion last year, most of them in road violence and several at the hands of hostage-takers.
In Mosul Lieutenant Colonel Paul Hastings, spokesman for Task Force Olympia, said that at 6:00 pm (1500 GMT) Friday, "soldiers of the multinational force went to a crossroads at Yarmuk and discovered three male bodies evidently killed earlier during the day in a rebel attack."
"All three had bullet wounds. The fourth, reported by news agencies, was not recovered," he said.

12/18/2004 13:18 GMT - AFP