TIKRIT, Iraq, April 13 (Xinhuanet) -- Unidentified militants attacked a convoy of police vehicles southwest of Samarra, the northern Iraqi city, wounding three bodyguards of the interior minister, the US military and Iraqi police said.

    "Gunmen opened fire at the convoy of the interior minister Falahal-Naqib, who was not in the vehicles, and wounded three of his bodyguards," the joint center of Iraqi-US forces said in a statement.

    In a separate incident, US soldiers on a checkpoint near Dowr opened fire at a civilian car, wounding Lie. Col. Hussein Ahmed and another policeman, the statement said.

    Meanwhile, the US forces saved an Iraqi national guard member near Baiji, after they traded fire with his kidnappers, who fled the scene leaving behind the hostage, according to the statement.

    The freed guardsman was kidnapped from his home in Baiji, some 200 km north of Baghdad, the statement said.  Enditem