Hassan Kamil, the executive manager of Shaabiya satellite channel, said the gunmen stormed the station's office in eastern Zayouna district at 7am local time, and shot two guards and five other members of staff.

The employees had been staying overnight in the station, which has not yet started regular broadcasts. They were shot in the head and chest while they lay sleeping in their beds, while one was shot in the bathroom.

Mr Kamil, who was not there at the time of the attack, told Reuters that the gunmen had arrived at the station in five or six vehicles. "Some of them were wearing police uniforms and other civilian clothing. All were masked," he said.

One employee survived the attack but was severely wounded and in hospital.

International media watchdogs say that Iraq is the most dangerous place in the world for journalists, who are often targets of insurgents. Reporters Without Borders says that 109 local and foreign journalists have been killed in Iraq since the US invasion in 2003.

Many of Iraq's newspapers and television stations are funded by political and religious groups. Their political affiliations make their staff targets for attack by militants from rival groups as well as Sunni insurgents.

Sectarian and insurgent violence continues to rage in the city, despite a major security crackdown by US and Iraqi troops aimed at curbing suicide car bombings, shootings and death squad killings.

A co-ordinated pair of bomb attacks in central Baghdad killed at least five people and injured 10, police said. First a bomb exploded in the busy Qurtaba Square, followed shortly afterward by second device planted nearby, which detonated as emergency crews arrived at the scene.

In further violence, authorities in Suwayrah, about 40 kilometres south of Baghdad, fished four bodies out of the Tigris that showed signs of torture. Two of the victims had their throats cut and two others had been shot and all were blindfolded and had their hands and legs bound.

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