By SINAN SALAHEDDIN, Associated Press Writer
BAGHDAD - The Fallujah city council chairman, a critic of al-Qaida who took the job after his three predecessors were assassinated, was killed on Saturday, the latest blow in a violent internal Sunni struggle for control of an insurgent stronghold west of Baghdad.
In the capital, U.S. and Iraqi officials defended plans to build a barrier around a Sunni enclave to protect its inhabitants from surrounding Shiite areas, while residents expressed concern it would isolate the community.
Sami Abdul-Amir al-Jumaili was gunned down by attackers in a passing car as he was walking outside his home in central Fallujah, 40 miles west of Baghdad, according to police.
His assassination came a month after he agreed to take the dangerous job — the only person willing to do so — with promises to improve services and work with the Americans to ease traffic-clogging checkpoints in the city with a population of an estimated 150,000 to 200,000.
http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070421/ap_on_re_mi_ea/iraq;_ylt=AnJ7jrSMWZ2Usyp3gCiUExDMWM0F