Bashar Hamid Agaidi, 32, was ambushed outside his home in the restive northern city of Mosul and died of his wounds in hospital, a doctor and a senior Iraqiya leader said.

"Gunmen set up an ambush for MP Bashar Hamid Agaidi outside his house in the Amil neighbourhood and opened fire when he got home," a police officer said, adding the lawmaker was rushed to hospital in "serious condition."

Doctor Fares al-Obeidi confirmed that Agaidi, 32, died of his wounds. Obeidi said Agaidi suffered gunshots to the head and chest.

Intisar Allawi, an MP and senior Iraqiya member, confirmed Agaidi's death and added that his brother, who was with him at the time of the shooting, had also been hit by gunshots and was in hospital.

Abdul Rahim al-Shammari, the head of the security committee for Nineveh province, which surrounds Mosul, said the Iraqi army arrested one suspect in connection with the shooting.

Government spokesman Ali al-Dabbagh condemned the killing, telling Al-Arabiya satellite television that "this was a criminal act against an important symbol who had just been elected."

Agaidi's death is the first assassination of an MP since the March 7 parliamentary elections in which Allawi's Iraqiya bloc won 91 seats in Iraq's 325-member Council of Representatives.

The father-of-two studied computer science at Mosul University and had been active in student politics, becoming president of its students' union.

He ran in provincial elections last year under the Sunni Arab Al-Hadbaa bloc of Osama al-Nujaifi, but failed to win a seat. Al-Hadbaa is now part of Iraqiya.

Incumbent Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's State of Law alliance came second with 89 seats and the Iraqi National Alliance, led by Shiite religious groups, came third with 70.

The latter two groups announced earlier this month they would band together, leaving them just four seats short of a parliamentary majority, though Kurdish MPs are likely to ally with the newly-formed coalition.

Mosul, 350 kilometres (220 miles) north of Baghdad, is the capital of Nineveh, one of the country's most violent and a hotspot of insurgent attacks.

Meanwhile, Iraqi election authorities said on Monday two successful candidates from the March election had violated rules, but it was unclear what, if any repercussions, they would suffer.

Electoral commission deputy chairwoman Amil al-Birarkdar, told state broadcaster Al-Iraqiya television earlier that one candidate from Diyala province in central Iraq had been sentenced to 10 years imprisonment.

The other from southern Basra, Major General Furat Mohsen Sharah, broke regulations that prohibit serving military officers from holding seats in parliament.

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