Iraqi gunmen kill Sunni chief and three sons

BAGHDAD: Gunmen killed a Sunni Arab village chief and his three sons when they burst into his home just south of Baghdad on Wednesday before fleeing, Iraqi security and medical officials said.

Just after midnight, the armed men entered the home of Mohammed Dwaiyeh, the chief of Albu Osaj village, and gunned down him and three of his sons and wounded another, an interior ministry official said.

The son who was hurt was a fighter in the anti-Qaeda militia known as the Sahwa, the official said. The Sahwa sided with the US military against Al-Qaeda from late-2006 onwards, helping turn the tide of the insurgency.

A medic at Yarmuk hospital in Baghdad confirmed the facility received the four bodies, and said they had been sent on to the city morgue.