(Agencies)
Updated: 2008-03-26 14:26

BAGHDAD - An American financial analyst working for the US Embassy in Baghdad has died of his wounds from an Easter Day rocket attack against the heavily fortified Green Zone, a spokeswoman said Tuesday.

A US soldier secures the site of a car bomb in Baghdad. A wave of attacks across Iraq on Sunday killed 54 people, while insurgents bombarded Baghdad's heavily fortified Green Zone with mortar fire, sending US embassy staff scurrying into bunkers. [Agencies]

Paul Converse, 56, was hit when rockets fired by suspected Shiite militia fighters rained down on the US-protected area in central Baghdad Sunday.

His parents, Dick and Leona Converse of Corvallis, Ore., told the Gazette-Times newspaper they learned Sunday that their son had been wounded and likely wouldn't survive. On Monday, two officers from the Oregon Army National Guard arrived at their door to inform them of his death.

The report was confirmed Tuesday by US Embassy spokesman Mirembe Nantongo.

The US military blamed Iranian-backed factions for a spate of rocket attacks that struck the Green Zone and surrounding areas on Sunday. Another volley slammed into the area on Tuesday, but Nantongo said no deaths or major casualties were reported.

The attacks underscored the fragility of Iraq's security, despite a decline in violence over the past year.

Converse was a financial analyst who audited contracts in Iraq, said Kristine Belisle, a spokeswoman for the Special Inspector General for Iraq Reconstruction, part of the US Department of Defense.

Leona Converse said her son telephoned from Iraq a week ago to wish her a happy 80th birthday, and sent e-mails almost every other day. She said he was proud of the work he was doing for the war-ravaged country.

The 4-square-mile Green Zone on the west bank of the Tigris River has been frequently struck by rockets and mortar rounds, though the attacks have tapered off amid stepped up security measures and the decrease in violence.

The rockets and mortars often fall into unpopulated fields that make up much of the Green Zone, but they have occasionally proven deadly.

On July 10, extremists unleashed a barrage of more than a dozen mortars or rockets into the Green Zone, killing at least three people - including an American - and wounding 18.