[JURIST] A judge on Iraq's federal court of appeal was assassinated by gunmen Monday morning on his way to work in the western Baghdad district of Mansour. Amir Jawdat al-Naeib was also a member of the Supreme Judicial Council, the body which administers judicial affairs in Iraq. AP has more. Voices of Iraq has local coverage.

The Judicial Council said in August that 31 Iraqi judges have been assassinated since the overthrow of Saddam Hussein. The Iraqi Lawyers Association reported in April last year that at least 210 lawyers and judges have been killed [IRIN report] since the US-led invasion, with dozens more injured in attacks which have prompted hundreds to leave the country. Many key Iraqi judges and their families now live in the fortified Green Zone in Baghdad or in the so-called Rule of Law complex [NYT report], a secure compound in the northern Baghdad neighborhood of Rusafa where they are supposedly safe from outside threats.