U.S. employee killed in Baghdad's Green Zone

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A U.S. government employee was killed and four others were wounded in Baghdad this week by rocket attacks on the Green Zone diplomatic and government compound, the U.S. State Department said on Thursday.

State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said the casualties occurred during four days of rocket attacks on the compound in central Baghdad beginning on Sunday.

"During this period a total of five U.S. government employees have been injured seriously. One of those five has died from his injuries," McCormack told a news briefing.

He said the person killed was believed to be a U.S. Army contract employee.

Mortar bombs and rockets have exploded across the capital for days. A strike near the U.S. Embassy in the fortified Green Zone on Thursday sent a column of black smoke into the sky.

McCormack said Green Zone rocket attacks occurred on Sunday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday. He blamed the attacks on "extremist criminal elements."

The killing in the Green Zone took place during the same week that the number of U.S. military personnel killed in Iraq since the 2003 invasion reached 4,000.

Precise Iraqi casualties are not known but the widely cited human rights group Iraq Body Count said this month that up to 89,300 civilians have been killed since 2003.

(Reporting by David Morgan; Editing by Xavier Briand)