Among those killed was a police colonel, while more than a dozen people were wounded in the attacks.

Two of the police victims were killed by an improvised bomb that targeted their patrol overnight south of Baghdad. The third was killed in the town of Fallujah west of the capital by a "sticky" bomb that attaches to cars.

Six policemen were wounded in the two attacks, a security source said.

A fourth policeman, Colonel Mustafa Said, was shot dead by gunmen using silencer pistols along the Mohammed al-Qassim highway in the centre of Baghdad, an interior ministry official said.

At a different point along the same highway, four people -- two policemen and two civilians -- were wounded by gunmen, the official said, but it was unclear if the two attacks were related.

Sticky bombs in different regions outside Baghdad killed the leader of an anti-Al-Qaeda militia and wounded one other person, a security official said.

Two civilian contractors for the Iraqi army, both male cousins, were killed when their home west of Baghdad was targeted by dynamite. Three other family members, including a woman, were wounded, police and medical sources said.

And in the capital's districts of Yarmuk and Dora, two people were killed and two others wounded by "sticky bombs".

And three other people, all civilians, were wounded by a mortar round that fell in the central Baghdad neighbourhood of Salhiyeh.

Violence in Iraq is sharply down from its peak in 2006 and 2007, but bombings, shootings and kidnappings remain common, especially in Baghdad.

The UN envoy to Iraq, Ad Melkert, said last week that violent incidents still occur on average 25 times per day, but acknowledged that the number was "a lot lower than what it used to be".

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