March 24, 2008, 07:45
A roadside bomb killed four U.S. soldiers in Baghdad on Sunday, the military said, bringing the number of U.S. military deaths to 4 000 since the invasion of Iraq in 2003.
The statement by U.S.-led coalition forces on Monday said one U.S. soldier was wounded in the attack.
The U.S. soldiers were killed at around 10 p.m. local time while on patrol in vehicles in southern Baghdad, it said.
The deaths came on a day when Baghdad's fortified "Green Zone" was assaulted repeatedly by rocket or mortar attack, and police said up to 17 people had been killed by rockets falling short outside the government and diplomatic compound.
The attacks were part of a wider increase in violence in the capital and in the northern city of Mosul, underlining warnings by U.S. military commanders that recent security gains in Iraq are both fragile and reversible.
In the past, the U.S. military has blamed such attacks on the Green Zone on rogue elements of Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al- Sadr's Mehdi Army militia. Sadr has imposed a ceasefire on the militia, but there have been signs that it is fraying.
In Mosul, a suicide truck bomber killed 15 Iraqi soldiers and wounded 45 people, including civilians, in an attack on an Iraqi army base, the Interior Ministry said. U.S. commanders describe Mosul as al Qaeda's last urban stronghold in Iraq. - Reuters
|
|
