Insurgents struck back after a post-election lull today, ambushing a minibus carrying new Iraqi army recruits, firing on Iraqis heading for work at a US base and gunning down an Iraqi soldier in the capital.

Gunmen ambushed Iraqi security forces in northern Iraq, killing 12 Iraqi army soldiers, an officer said today.

Four people were killed in Iraq today after two bombs targeted a police station and a recruitment centre in separate attacks.

Militants pounded central Baghdad today with one of their most intense mortar barrages ever, targeting the Green Zone and destroying a US vehicle along a major street.

A suicide attacker detonated a car bomb today outside the Iraqi police academy in the northern city of Kirkuk as hundreds of trainees and civilians were leaving for the day, authorities said.

Large explosions were heard tonight at the US base at Kirkuk airport, and an Iraqi officer said it appeared the blasts were coming from the ammunition dump there.

US aircraft destroyed a Baghdad office of a radical Shiite cleric, killing two people and injuring six, his followers said today.

Gunmen opened fire on a car in the northern oil city of Kirkuk today, killing an Iraqi and a South African and seriously injuring a New Zealander.