U.S. Embassy staff, soldiers killed in Baghdad blast Story Highlights *
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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- Four Americans -- two soldiers and two civilians from the Defense and State departments -- were killed Tuesday in a blast that rocked a municipal building in Baghdad's Sadr City, the U.S. Embassy said.
The attack also killed six Iraqis and wounded 10 others, an Iraqi Interior Ministry official said.
A second employee from the U.S. Defense Department also died, but that person wasn't an American. The employee was a dual Italian-Iraqi national, the Italian Foreign Ministry said.
The U.S. military said the blast struck a meeting of a district advisory council, a neighborhood group that looks at local needs and passes on its assessments to the provincial government.
The deputy head of the council was seriously injured, the Interior Ministry official said.
The U.S. military blamed Iranian-backed militants it calls Special Groups for the blast and detained three people in connection with the attack, including a suspect "fleeing the scene [who] tested positive for explosive residue."
"We believe the target of the attack was a high-ranking [district advisory council] member as well as the U.S. soldiers," said Lt. Col. Steve Stover, a U.S. military spokesman.
"We believe the Special Groups criminals were upset that the DAC member was working with coalition forces to improve the quality of life for the southern Sadr City residents."
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A statement from Ryan Crocker, U.S. ambassador to Iraq, identified the slain State Department employee as Steve Farley.
"Mr. Farley was a member of our embedded Provincial Reconstruction Team for the Sadr City and Adhamiya districts of Baghdad City," the statement said.
"We extend our deepest condolences to their families and friends, and our profound appreciation for the ultimate sacrifice that they made in service to their country and for the people of Iraq. This is a tragic loss and one we all mourn."
The U.S. Embassy statement didn't identify the other victims.
The blast dramatizes the perils the war still poses for Americans despite a Pentagon report Monday that touted a sharp decrease in violence in Iraq in recent months.
The explosion also marked the third strike in two days involving local politicians and political institutions in Baghdad.
A city councilman on Monday fired on U.S. forces at a municipal building southeast of the capital in the Salman Pak area and killed two soldiers.
Separately, the head of Abu Dsheer City Council in Baghdad's southern Dora area was gunned down at his home later Monday.
Last week, a bomb ripped through Baghdad's Hurriya district near a neighborhood advisory council meeting where U.S. troops were stationed, killing 63 people and wounding 71 others.
The U.S. military also blamed that attack on a Special Groups cell, but Stover couldn't say whether it was connected to Tuesday's blast.
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