More than a dozen rockets fired from donkey carts slammed into Iraq’s Oil Ministry and two hotels today – in brazen coordinated strikes at Baghdad’s most heavily protected civilian sites.

At least 10 people have been killed in a car bomb blast outside a Baghdad hotel.

IRAQI police opened fire in downtown Baghdad yesterday after demonstrators demanding jobs stormed a police station and threw stones at officers, police said. At least one demonstrator was injured in the shooting.

A big explosion, believed to be a roadside bomb which detonated prematurely, blew up in a pile of rubbish in Baghdad tonight.

MAZEN DANA, the Reuters cameraman killed by US troops in Iraq, was buried yesterday in the West Bank city where he braved bullets to chronicle the tragedy of Israeli-Palestinian bloodshed.

An Australian newspaper said today it had been handed an audiotape purported to have been recorded by Saddam Hussein inside Iraq earlier that day.

THE United States yesterday pledged to build a new Iraq from the ashes of war, but faced mounting challenges as ethnic tension simmered in the north and Shi’ite Muslims staged an anti-American protest in the capital.

US Marines battled snipers outside a hotel in central Baghdad today, while calm appeared to return to other parts of the Iraqi capital.

LOOTERS in Baghdad set their sights yesterday on the symbols of Saddam Hussein’s dying regime, swarming a palace overlooking the Tigris River to nab bone china with the Iraqi eagle insignia, fancy wash basins and bath tubs — even fish from the garden pond.

American forces advanced into Iraq’s third city today, as the coalition continued to seize control across the north of the country.

American forces were today expected to step up their hunt for the remnants of Saddam Hussein’s regime in Baghdad, after four US Marines were seriously injured in a suicide attack in the centre of the Iraqi capital.

US forces battled fighters still loyal to Saddam Hussein in Baghdad today as rampant looting persisted in the capital.

Kuwaiti television has trumpeted the joy of Iraqis after the fall of Baghdad to US troops, with a presenter saying it is a “slap in the face” to those Arabs who sided with Saddam Hussein.

Iraqi civilians have torn up and spat at portraits of Saddam Hussein in multiple acts against the Saddam regime in Baghdad today.

THE world is holding its breath to hear whether Saddam Hussein and his two sons are dead or alive following an allied “decapitation” strike.

Three journalists were hurt today in a blast at Baghdad’s Palestine Hotel, the base for most foreign correspondents in the Iraqi capital.