Iraqi leader Sistani targeted by assassins

Initial reports of the assassination attempt on Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani were sketchy. But a source close to Sistani told AFP a man was intercepted by bodyguards as he tried to break into the ayatollah's office to carry out "a criminal act targeting" the ayatollah.

Asked whether Sistani's insistence on elections could have been behind the assassination attempt, Sunni member of the Iraq Governing Council Nasir Chaderchi said: "Everyone wants elections in Iraq, some want them before the transfer of power and some after."

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The foiled attack came a day before a team of UN experts was due in Baghdad to assess the feasibility of Sistani's demand for direct elections for Iraq's first post-occupation government to properly reflect his community's demographic weight.

The evaluation team -- the first full-scale UN mission to the country since it pulled out its international staff after a deadly bombing last year -- was due to arrive Friday and stay for about 10 days.

The two Iraqis shot dead in Fallujah were identified as Saadun Shukr and Mustafa Zoubai, both 25 and unemployed.

Flyers distributed by masked men in the city after the killings said "two master spies who were denouncing the sons of Fallujah have been shot dead."