(Xinhua)
Updated: 2008-01-03 10:28

WASHINGTON -- The United States is preparing to send diplomatic security and FBI agents to Sudan to help probe the murder of an American diplomat, the State Department said Wednesday.

"Diplomatic Security and the FBI are going to be sending a joint team to Sudan to investigate the murder," State Department spokesman Sean McCormack said.

The team members, who are waiting for visas, will be "collecting the evidence they possibly can to work closely with the Sudanese government to determine who's responsible for these murders and bring them to justice," the spokesman said.

U.S. diplomat John Granville, who worked for the US Agency for International Development, died of injuries sustained in a shooting incident in Khartoum, the capital of Sudan, on Tuesday.

It was reported that unknown gunmen opened fire as the US diplomat was heading home in an embassy vehicle just before the sunrise on New Year's day. The driver was killed instantly and Granville was moved to a local hospital where he died from his wounds.

The attack occurred one day after US President George W. Bush signed a law aimed at increasing economic pressure on the Sudanese government.

This was the first time that a foreign diplomat was shot over years in Sudan, where a hatred against western countries especially the US was popular among the grass-roots.