Special report: Tension escalates in Iraq

    RAMADI, Iraq, Sept. 17 (Xinhua) -- An Awakening Council group leader was killed on Wednesday by a bomb explosion in the city of Ramadi, the capital of Anbar province, a provincial police source said.

    "Muhannad al-Ubeidi, head of the Council group in the neighborhood of Ta'mim in western Ramadi, some 110 km west of Baghdad, was killed by a bomb planted in his car while traveling with his brother in the neighborhood," the source told Xinhua on condition of anonymity.

    The explosive charge was of a magnetic kind, which had been stuck in Ubeidi's car and totally destroyed it, the source said.

    Ubeidi's brother was severely wounded and transported to a nearby hospital for treatment, he said.

    Iraqi security forces sealed off the area and began immediately a search operation in the neighborhood, he added.

    The Awakening Council groups, or Sahwa fighters, are U.S.-backed armed groups, who fight the al-Qaida network after the latter exercised indiscriminate killings against both Shiite and Sunni Muslim communities.