Insurgents killed at least 64 people in a wave of attacks against Iraqi security forces today.

A wave of car bombings targeting Shia pilgrims has killed at least 65 people and wounded another 200 in several cities across Iraq, in one of the deadliest attacks since US troops withdrew from the country.

A WAVE of bombings targeting Shi’ites in Iraq have killed 72 people, deepening sectarian tensions that exploded after the last American troops left the country in mid- December.

More than 50 people have died in bomb attacks in Iraq, officials say.

A DOZEN terror suspects disguised in police uniforms strolled out of an Iraqi jail yesterday — even though the 12 were the only detainees held at the makeshift prison.

Gunmen shot dead a family of five in a pre-dawn attack on a home outside Baghdad.

A car bomb ripped through a market in southern Iraq’s Shiite heartland today as shoppers were buying meat and vegetables, killing about 30 people and wounding dozens more, officials said.

Iraqi officials have raised the casualty toll in a car bombing in a mainly Shiite area of southern Iraq to as many as 35 killed and 45 wounded.

Twelve people died in overnight clashes in Baghdad’s Sadr City district, which has become a chief battleground between US and Iraqi forces and the Mahdi Army of anti-American cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, police and hospital officials said today.

Fighting continued to paralyse the Iraqi city of Basra today as battles between government troops and militia spread across the country.

Iraqi police said today clashes between Shiite militants and government security forces have resumed in at least two cities south of Baghdad.

Iraqi forces battled with Shiite militia today for control of the southern oil port of Basra.

Violence left at least 46 people dead in two major southern cities in Iraq when members of a messianic cult attacked police and fellow Shiite worshippers.

Dozens of suspected al-Qaida militants stormed an Iraqi Shiite village north of Baghdad today, killing at least 13 people and torching homes, police said.

As many as 36 people were killed in a fierce battle early today between Shiite militiamen and British forces doing house-to-house searches south of Baghdad, Iraqi police and hospital officials said.

Iraqi forces will take over security control of a southern province from coalition troops next month, state-run television quoted the prime minister as saying today.

An explosives attack on an Italian military patrol in southern Iraq killed one soldier and wounded four others tonight, reports in Rome said.

In a rare claim, an armed faction of Iraq’s Shiite community has said it attacked a US military vehicle and a car carrying Western contractors, according to a video broadcast by Al-Jazeera today.

SISTER of Iraq’s new Sunni Arab vice-president was killed in a drive-by shooting in Baghdad yesterday, a day after the politician called for the Sunni-dominated insurgency to be crushed by force.

A bomb blast rocked an Italian base in southern Iraq today, with Italian news agencies reporting at least four people killed and one seriously injured.

A suicide bomber detonated an explosive belt in a Baghdad bus as it was about to depart for a Shiite city in the south today, killing up to 30 people and wounding dozens more.

A suicide bomber detonated an explosive belt in a Baghdad bus as it was about to depart for a Shiite city in the south today, killing at least 12 people and wounding 27.

Two people were killed as police fought with voters trying to break the police blockades of polling stations in opposition strongholds today, the final day of Egypt’s parliamentary elections.

Insurgents today killed 19 Iraqi soldiers and wounded four others in a co-ordinated ambush northeast of Baghdad just two days after the deadliest attack against United States Marines in four months.

The Guardian newspaper said today one of its reporters has disappeared in Iraq and it believes he was kidnapped.

FOUR American and four Italian military personnel were killed in separate aircraft crashes, military officials said yesterday, as Iraq’s prime minister condemned the arrest of a top Sunni political leader by US troops.

Separate air crashes killed four American and four Italian troops, officials said today, and the governor of Anbar province was killed during clashes between US forces and the insurgents who abducted him three weeks ago.

An Iraqi Air Force aircraft crash killed four US Air Force staff and one Iraqi, the American military said today.

Sectarian tension whipped through Iraq as thousands of Shiite and Sunni Muslim protesters mixed calls for an end to America’s occupation with stinging condemnations of each other.

THOUSANDS of Shi'ites, many waving the Koran over their heads, protested the US presence in Iraq yesterday after the detention of several supporters of a radical cleric.

Insurgents blew up an oil pipeline in the northern oil fields of Iraq and killed two senior police officers in Baghdad, officials said today, as political leaders sized up their positions following confirmation of election results.

FOUR Italian army pilots who refused to fly in Iraq, citing safety concerns, were cleared of cowardice charges by a military judge yesterday.

Four Italian army pilots who refused to fly in Iraq, citing safety concerns, were cleared of cowardice charges by a military judge today.

Iraqi officials released the first partial returns from national elections, showing a commanding lead by candidates backed by the Shiite Muslim clergy.

Iraqi voters, hoping to restore order and security to their troubled nation, filed into schools and other makeshift polling stations in neighbouring nations today to cast ballots in their nation’s first democratic election in half a century.

Fire swept through the general hospital in the southern Iraqi city of Nasiriyah early today, killing at least 12 people and injuring up to 100, the fire department said.

A car bomb exploded outside a Shiite mosque packed with worshippers celebrating a major Muslim holiday yesterday, and a suicide driver blew up an ambulance at the wedding of a Shiite couple south of the capital.

A US Black Hawk helicopter crashed shortly after take off in southern Iraq today, wounding three crew members, the military said.

Plumes of black smoke rose above the embattled city of Najaf today after American warplanes bombed insurgent positions overnight and supporters of a radical cleric charged that shrapnel from a US attack had hit parts of the Imam Ali Shrine. The military denied the claim.

Hours after being freed by kidnappers who threatened to kill him, US journalist Micah Garen said he hoped to stay in Iraq to continue working on a documentary project he had started about the looting of archaeological sites.

Explosions and gunfire shook Najaf’s Old City in a fierce battle between US forces and Shiite militants, who remained in control of a revered shrine here as negotiations dragged on for its handover to religious authorities.

European governments should put divisions over Iraq behind them and join in helping the US restore order there, the European Commission’s incoming president said today.

A top aide to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr said today that kidnappers who abducted and threatened to kill a US journalist had promised to set him free.

Top aides to firebrand Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr called on kidnappers to immediately free a western journalist they had threatened to kill unless US forces withdrew from the holy city of Najaf.