US admits Iraqis shot by troops
Brigadier-General Vince Brooks said US marines and special forces soldiers fired at demonstrators on Tuesday after they came under attack from people shooting guns and throwing rocks.
"Fire was indeed delivered from coalition forces, it was lethal fire and some Iraqis were killed as a result. We think the number is in the order of seven and we think there were some wounded as well," he said.
A BBC correspondent in the city said Mosul was extremely tense and latest reports from there say at least three people have been killed and several others wounded by gunfire.
The French news agency AFP quoted an Iraqi police officer as saying the police fired into the air to disperse looters who were trying to rob a bank.
Witnesses said US troops then fired on a crowd close to the building from nearby rooftops.
US forces had earlier denied responsibility for the killings on Tuesday.
The incident underlines the difficulties US forces face in trying to keep the peace in a country now confronting an uncertain future.
The trouble began as an angry crowd gathered outside the governor's building, demanding that Kurdish peshmerga fighters and Americans leave the city, witnesses told the BBC.
The US military has a major security problem.
The city's population is dominated by Sunni Arabs fiercely opposed to Kurdish control. Mosul's new governor, Mashaan al-Juburi an Arab associated with the peshmerga appears to have tried to pacify the crowd.
