Gunmen ambushed an Iraqi police checkpoint in northern Iraq before dawn today, killing six officers in a sophisticated attack on fledgling Iraqi security installations, police said.

American troops battled with Shiite gunmen today in Baghdad, killing at least eight in pre-dawn fighting, the US military said.

A majority of Iraqi politicians have signed draft legislation that calls for a timetable for the withdrawal of foreign troops from Iraq.

Cabinet ministers loyal to radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr will withdraw from the Iraqi government later today, the head of his parliamentary bloc said.

The chief US military spokesman in Iraq today insisted that Muqtada al-Sadr has left the country and is believed to be in Iran, despite denials from the radical Shiite cleric’s supporters.

Iraqi authorities have reported the arrests of two guards and an official who supervised Saddam Hussein's hanging and said the guard force was infiltrated by outsiders who taunted the former leader and shot the video showing his body dangling at the end of a rope.

An adviser to Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki today said the person who made the leaked video of Saddam Hussein’s hanging had been detained.

Executed Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was buried shortly before sunrise today inside a compound for religious ceremonies in the town of his birth.

Former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was executed today.

SECURITY forces are closing in on the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, a senior Iraqi official said yesterday, showing a captured video of the terror chief teaching followers how to build a car bomb.

Security forces are closing in on the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, a senior official said today, showing a captured video of the terror chief teaching followers how to build a car bomb.

Iraq’s national security adviser today announced the arrest of the second most senior figure in al Qaida in Iraq.

A SUICIDE car bomber detonated explosives in a crowd of labourers gathered across the street from a major Shi’ite shrine in southern Iraq yesterday, killing at least 53 people and wounding 105.

Iraqi security forces have detained the leaders of the Omar Brigade group, a wing of al-Qaida in Iraq that had claimed to have carried out many deadly attacks throughout the country, according to National Security Adviser Mouwafak al-Rubaie.

A Jordanian who was responsible for slaughtering two US soldiers last month was fatally wounded in a clash with security forces, a senior Iraqi official said today.

Iraq released a most-wanted list of 41 names today, including Saddam Hussein’s wife and eldest daughter, as well as the new leader of al Qaida in Iraq and one of the ousted president’s closest allies.

Terror leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi has been buried in an undisclosed location, the US military and Iraqi government officials said today.

Iraq’s National Security adviser today said authorities had arrested a key al-Qaida suspect – a Tunisian – wanted for the bombing of the Shiite Golden Dome shrine last February in Samarra.

A large explosion heavily damaged the golden dome of one of Iraq’s most famous Shiite religious shrines today, sending protesters pouring into the streets. It was the third major attack against Shiite targets in as many days.

Suicide bombers blasted through the concrete walls surrounding the Palestine Hotel in central Baghdad, where many foreign journalists live and work, injuring about five people inside the hotel and killing at least six passers-by on the streets outside.

THREE massive vehicle bombs exploded yesterday near Baghdad’s Palestine Hotel, home to many Western journalists, killing at least 20 people.

ANY delay in Iraq’s January 30 elections would lead to civil war and a “bloodbath” in the country, the interim government’s national security advisor warned yesterday.

Truce talks aimed at ending more than a week of violence between Shiite militants and US and Iraqi forces in the holy city of Najaf broke down today, Iraqi National Security Adviser Mouwaffaq al-Rubaie said.

Radical cleric Muqtada al-Sadr has agreed to withdraw his militia from Najaf and hand the city back to Iraqi police, the government said, raising hopes for an end to weeks of fighting with coalition forces.

Iraq’s US-appointed Governing Council has met for the first time to look into ways of appointing judges to a new war crimes tribunal that could try Saddam Hussein.

THE massive blast when a petrol tanker exploded in a fireball after colliding with a bus in the centre of Baghdad yesterday, killing 17 Iraqis, was an accident, said US military investigators.