Eight Oil Workers Killed in N. Iraq

'Agents of Occupation' Are Shot On Day of Roadside Explosions

BAGHDAD, March 30 -- A bus ferrying oil workers to their job was forced to the side of a road in northern Iraq by masked gunmen, who ordered the workers to get off, accused them of being "agents of the occupation" and then shot them, killing eight, police said.

The workers were all employees of one of Iraq's largest oil refineries, in Baiji, a town about 120 miles north of Baghdad.

In the capital, meanwhile, one person was killed and 11 were injured in two roadside bombings; two were killed and seven injured in a car bombing; and five people were injured when a suicide car bomber detonated explosives near a police convoy.

The Reuters news agency reported that a U.S. airman was killed and another wounded by a roadside bomb near Baghdad. In addition, a soldier who was wounded in action on March 28 in Anbar province died of his wounds, the military said in a statement. No further details were available.

In Ramadi, the Anbar capital, which is 60 miles west of Baghdad and a stronghold of al-Qaeda in Iraq, the bodies of three workers from Ramadi General Hospital were found blindfolded and shot in the head, according to Haiythan al-Dilami, a physician there. He said al-Qaeda in Iraq had asserted responsibility for the killings in a note found with the bodies that accused the men of being homosexuals.

In the killing of the oil workers, Lt. Nawras Hamed of the Baiji police said one man, Salih Abed, survived the attack and told police that the minibus in which he and his co-workers were traveling was forced off the road by three cars containing masked gunmen. He said the gunmen ordered everyone off the bus while firing their weapons wildly into the air to scare off other vehicles.

Abed, who was shot in the stomach and leg, told police that the gunmen admonished the workers, "You are all agents of the occupation," and then shot them, Hamed said. He said all eight who died were killed by gunshot wounds to the head and chest.

Capt. Hakim Azzawi of the Tikrit Hospital Police said most of the victims were residents of the area. "They were killed only because they worked for the state refineries," Azzawi said.

In other news, the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq, the country's most powerful Shiite political party, released a statement denying reports that U.S. Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad had recently told Shiite leaders that President Bush opposed their coalition's nominee for prime minister, Ibrahim al-Jafari.

The nomination of Jafari, who has been transitional prime minister for about a year, has drawn intense opposition from Sunni Arab and Kurdish political parties -- a key reason for the delay in forming a new, four-year government. But reports that Bush and Khalilzad were pushing for his ouster drew harsh complaints that the United States was interfering in Iraq's fledgling democracy.

"I met Ambassador Khalilzad yesterday, and he said this report is untrue," Jafari told reporters Thursday. "I don't worry about this subject because the Iraqi people chose me. If the Iraqi people choose someone else, I will respect this choice."

Other Washington Post staff members contributed to this report.