A suspected suicide car bomb attacked the office of a leading Iraqi Shiite party on Tuesday morning in central Baghdad, killing one person, the Dubai-based al- Arabiyah TV channel reported.
The blast took place at about 6 a.m. (0300 GMT) in the Jadriyah office of the Supreme Council for the Islamic Revolution in Iraq (SCIRI) when a suicide bomber drove his explosive-laden car toward the office and donated the bomb by a checkpoint barrier about 60 meters away, the report said.
A spokesman from the party said one person was killed and two others were wounded.
However, witnesses said they saw two people killed and six wounded.
Iraqi police put the death toll at five, including one policeman, the channel said.
This was the second attack on the party's headquarters in less than one month. On Dec. 28, a suicide car bomb killed 13 people outside SCIRI's office, destroying a house across the street from the party's building, which also houses its political leader Abdel Aziz Hakim.
That attack was claimed by the group of Al-Qaida linked Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
The bombings came as US-Iraqi forces scrambled to rein in surging violence across the Sunni heartland in the run-up to the scheduled Jan. 30 polls in the country.
Insurgents bent on disrupting the elections have stepped up attacks against Iraqi national guards, police and Shiite Muslims.