Gunmen kill Iraq government employee and family

BAGHDAD (AP) Gunmen broke into the home of a Health Ministry employee in a town north of Iraq's capital and killed him and his family, as attacks across the country left a total of 20 dead on Sunday, officials said.

The attackers used guns fitted with silencers killed the employee, his wife, two sons and a 10-year old daughter as they slept in their home in Sadiyah early Sunday morning, police said, adding that they are investigating the incident but have no motive for the attack or any suspects.

Sadiyah is 95 kilometers (60 miles) north of Baghdad.

Also, a bomb attached to a bus killed two commuters and wounded seven in Waziriyah neighborhood in northern Baghdad, police said. In the northern city of Mosul, a roadside bomb missed an army patrol but killed two civilians and wounded four, authorities said.

Also in Mosul, gunmen shot dead Nawras al-Nuaimi, a female TV presenter working for a local channel, as she was walking near her house Sunday night, said police.

Later on, police said a car bomb exploded near a restaurant, killing three people and wounding four others in eastern Baghdad.

Four people were also killed and six wounded in a car bomb explosion targeting a commercial street in Baghdad's northeastern suburb of Husseiniyah.

Police said three people were killed and eight others wounded when a sticky bomb attached to their bus went off in the Shiite neighborhood of Sadr city.

Health officials confirmed the death toll for all attacks. All officials spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak to journalists.

Violence has been on the rise in Iraq since a deadly crackdown on a Sunni protest camp in a northern town in April. At least 224 people have died in attacks across the country so far this month, according to an Associated Press count.

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Associated Press writer Qassim Abdul-Zahra contributed.