Sunday, May 22 2005 18:21 Hrs (IST) - World Time -

Baghdad: Insurgents launched a string of bloody attacks in Iraq today (May 22, 2005), shooting dead a senior civil servant in Baghdad and bombing a police station in Saddam Hussein's hometown of Tikrit.

This followed the killing of 12 Interior Ministry commandos yesterday in a series of clashes in and around the restive city of Samarra, in central Iraq.

Over the past weeks, rebels have increasingly targeted newly-minted Iraqi security forces, who are taking on a more prominent role in anti-insurgency operations, especially in towns.

Meanwhile, US officials acknowledged that poor security in the country is hobbling efforts to speed up reconstruction and that security accounts for 16 percent of all spending on reconstruction projects.

In the latest violence, a senior civil servant at Iraq's Trade Ministry was shot dead while being driven to work this morning in northwest Baghdad, an Interior Ministry official said.

Ali Mussa Salman, the Ministry's director general, died along with his driver, the latest victim in a string of well-planned attacks on senior civil servants in the capital.

One civilian was also killed and 10 wounded when unidentified gunmen opened fire from a car in the western Baghdad district of Al-Gzalia late yesterday, an Interior Ministry official said. The victims' identity was not immediately clear.

Six more civilians were hurt when mortar bombs fell short of an Army base in western Baghdad overnight, hitting their homes, security officials said.