Iraq leaders struggle to reach compromise on constitution

IRAQI politicians tried to reach compromises with Sunni Arab leaders yesterday on the country’s draft constitution, one day after synchronised bombings near at a bus station and nearby hospital killed up to 43 people in the capital.

Four US soldiers were killed in a roadside bombing north of Baghdad, the US military said. The explosion occurred in the tense, religiously mixed city of Samarra, 60 miles north of the capital.

Government officials said yesterday’s bombings - two believed to have been suicide attacks and the third a stationary car bomb - were an attempt to target Shi’ites and stoke civil war between religious groups in the country.