BAGHDAD, Aug. 2 (Xinhuanet) -- Nine Iraqis were killed, including a police officer, in separate attacks in Baghdad on Tuesday, police said.

    "Armed men gunned down Colonel Haider Mizhir Hamid, the police chief of Abu Ghraib area, in a drive-by shooting as he was heading for work in his car in eastern Baghdad," a police source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

    Another policeman accompanying Hamid was wounded in the attack that took place at about 8:05 a.m. (0405 GMT) in al-Ubaidi district, the source said.

    In separate incident, five civilians were killed at about 5:30 a.m. (1:30 GMT) by unknown gunmen as they were passing by in their car in the mainly Shiite neighborhood of Shu'la, a police source said.

    He said the five victims had taken the body of an Imam of a Sunni mosque in Ghazaliyah district and another wounded worshipper,both were shot by unknown gunmen, to al-Noor Hospital in the Shu'ladistrict on Monday night.

    They could not leave the hospital late at night as the Iraqi government and US forces impose curfew on Iraqi cities from midnight to 5:00 a.m., "but they were ambushed after the curfew," the source added.

    In another incident, two employees working for the Ministry of Finance were shot dead in western Baghdad as they were heading to work, the police said. Enditem