At least 16 killed in Iraq attacks

Baghdad, Feb 17 (AFP) A car bomb killed 13 people at avehicle trade fair in the deadliest of a string of attackstoday in which 16 died, including a university professorhanged in his home.

Among those killed were a journalist, the professorand a Sunni Muslim imam, while 35 other people were wounded,security officials said.

In the worst violence, a vehicle packed withexplosives was detonated in the middle of a car sales fair inthe town of Muqdadiyah, northeast of Baghdad in restive Diyalaprovince.

Iraqi army Major Abbas al-Tamim put the casualty tollat 13 dead and 35 wounded.

Muqdadiyah is a mostly Shiite Muslim town with asubstantial Sunni population.

While violence has declined nationwide since its peakin 2006 and 2007, Diyala remains one of Iraq''s least secureregions.

In the northern city of Mosul, an Iraqi journalist wasgunned down outside his home and a Sunni imam was killedinside his house, local police said.

Two gunmen shot dead Hilal al-Ahmadi, 50 and a fatherof four, as he left his home in Mithaq, an eastern district ofMosul, a police captain said, asking not to be named.

Ahmadi worked for two local weeklies, Mosul Echo andIraqiyoun.

Paris-based watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF)condemned the murder and demanded an investigation intoAhmadi''s killing.

"The murders of journalists in Iraq are not letting upand generalised impunity is fuelling the cycle of violence,"RSF secretary-general Jean-Francoi Julliard said in astatement.

According to Iraq''s Journalistic Freedoms Observatory,more than 250 journalists and media workers have been killedin the country since the 2003 US-led invasion. (AFP)