Baghdad - A car bomb on Wednesday ripped through the motorcade of

Baghdad - Iraqi police on Tuesday killed a would-be suicide bomber, while six people were injured in separate explosions in Baghdad, Mosul and Baquba.

Police forces gunned down a suicide bomber before he could detonate himself near a security patrol in al-Yarmook neighbourhood in the southern section of Mosul city, police sources told Deutsche Presse-Agentur dpa.

A policeman was wounded as a result of the blast that occurred when the explosives strapped to the bomber's body went off, the source added.

Mosul, the capital city of Nineveh province, lies some 400 kilometres north of the capital Baghdad.

Baghdad  - Two civilians were killed and eight others wounded in separate bomb attacks in central and northern Iraq on Monday, local media cited police sources as saying.

Two people were killed in a bomb attack in the al-Eishaqi region south of the town of Tikrit, located 175 kilometres north of the capital Baghdad, the Voices of Iraq (VOI) news agency reported.

In Baghdad, four civilians were injured by a bomb that was stuck to a civilian vehicle and was detonated in the Saeeda area in the city's south-east, a police source told VOI.

Geneva, Jan. 19 : The Iraqi journalist who threw shoes at U. S. President George W. Bush during the latter''s surprise visit to Baghdad last month, will seek political asylum in Switzerland, his Geneva-based lawyer has said.

According to a foreign news agency report, lawyer Mauro Poggia says Muntadhar al-Zeidi''s life is in danger in Iraq.

Al-Zeidi is currently in an Iraqi jail awaiting trial on charges of assaulting a foreign leader for his December 14 shoe-throwing incident at a news conference in Baghdad.

Baghdad- US vice president-elect Joe Biden arrived in the northern Iraqi city of Kirkuk on Tuesday, Iraqi radio reported.

The status of Kirkuk, which is home to a mix of Kurds, Arabs and Turkmen, as well as 10-20 per cent of Iraq's proven oil reserves, has long been a source of dispute.

Many Kurds hope the city will eventually become the capital of an autonomous region in northern Iraq.

Iraqis are expected to watch Biden's comments closely, particularly given the senator's previous support for partitioning Iraq into three semi-autonomous regions.