Gunmen kidnapped a general in the Iraqi army in western Baghdad, after they detonated a suspected suicide car bomb at his convoy on Tuesday, witnesses said.

Brigadier General Jalal Mohammed Saleh was abducted in the attack that took place at Ameriyah intersection in western Baghdad, after some gunmen pulled him from his car, they said.

Saleh was a commander of a special armoured division in Saddam Hussien's dissolved army.

Meanwhile, a car bomb blew up Tuesday close to a US military convoy in Baghdad's southern district of Dora, destroying a US Humvee, Qatar-based al-Jazeera TV channel reported.

The blast also destroyed a civilian car, wounding at least one person, but it not known whether there were any casualties among the US forces.