Gunmen in Baghdad hunted down three different government employees and shot them dead on their way to work Wednesday, police said.

An Iraqi worker carries bags of government wheat rations in the Shiite Baghdad suburb of Sadr City. Australian Prime Minister John Howard has been summoned to give evidence at an inquiry into the payment of sanctions-busting bribes to Saddam Hussein's Iraq by the nation's monopoly wheat exporter. [AFP]

An internal affairs officer at the Interior Ministry was killed by men in two cars while leaving his house in Amil in western Baghdad. A Housing Ministry employee was killed as he drove to work in the same neighborhood, police said.

In northern Baghdad, gunmen shot down an Oil Ministry worker at a bus stop, police said.

The motives of the attacks were not known, police said.