Roadside bombings targeting Iraqi soldiers in Baghdad and north of the capital killed six people today, police said.

A car bomb exploded today in central Iraq, killing five people, including four police officers on patrol, while gunmen killed an education official in Baghdad.

A suicide car bomber attacked a Shiite Muslim community centre near Baghdad today, killing three people and wounding eight, police said.

Nine people died and 14 were seriously wounded in a gas tanker explosion in west Baghdad just hours after a surprise visit to the Iraqi capital by US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld.

Explosions and gunfire echoed across the holy city of Najaf today as the US military and Iraqi forces launched a full-scale assault to crush a weeklong uprising by militiamen loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Heavy gun battles are taking place in the holy city of Najaf today, as US forces prepare to launch a final assault on militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.

Clashes between British forces and Shiite militia in the southern Iraqi city of Amarah left 14 people dead and 42 injured today, according to the Health Ministry.

British troops suffered two minor casualties during overnight fighting in the southern Iraqi Shiite city of Amarah that left ten militants dead and 50 Iraqis injured.

At least six Iraqis were killed and nine wounded in an explosion in a market north of Baghdad today.

TWO American soldiers were shot dead while waiting in traffic in Mosul yesterday, a day after suicide bombers killed up to 20 people in attacks on two police stations northeast of Baghdad.

Gunmen killed two American soldiers today while they were driving through the northern Iraqi city of Mosul and a crowd swarmed over the scene, looting the vehicle and pummelling the bodies, witnesses said.

Two car bombs, one of them driven by a suicide attacker, exploded today at police stations in towns near Baghdad, killing at least 16 people, most of them policemen, US and Iraqi officials said.