Car bomb attacks kill 14 Iraqis and US soldier

TWO car bombs exploded in separate cities in Iraq yesterday, killing at least 14 Iraqis and one US soldier. Dozens were wounded, including 10 soldiers.

A US Marine was killed in action west of Baghdad.

Elsewhere, six coalition soldiers two Poles, three Slovaks and a Latvian were killed in an explosion while defusing mines in Suwayrah, 25 miles south of Baghdad, authorities said.

The Slovaks and the Latvians were the first deaths from either of the two countries in Iraq, Polish officials said in Warsaw.

One of the car bombs blew up as a convoy of provincial council members passed by in the northern city of Mosul. The council members escaped injury, officials said. Nine people died and about 25 were injured, the US military said. The Mosul deputy police chief was hurt, but not seriously.

In the other attack, a suicide attacker detonated a car bomb during rush hour outside the American forward operating base War Horse in Baqouba, about 30 miles north-east of Baghdad.

At least five Iraqis and one US soldier were killed, the US military and police said. Fifteen Iraqis and 10 American soldiers were wounded while standing at a security checkpoint.

A US Marine was also killed in action, the military said. The death occurred on Monday in Anbar province west of Baghdad, but the military released no further details.

In Ramadi, a Sunni Muslim city in Anbar province, a bomb exploded as a convoy of Westerners passed by, witnesses and police said yesterday. The Westerners fired back after the Monday night attack. Hospital officials said eight Iraqis were killed and three injured.

The identity of the Westerners was unclear, and there was no immediate comment from US authorities.

Attackers also fired several mortar rounds at a military base camp in the northern part of Mosul, the military said. Two contract employees received non-life-threatening injuries.

The new Iraqi interim government has made security its top priority as it assumes more responsibility for running the country. The new prime minister, Iyad Allawi, is close to the CIA and the State Department and as an exile leader headed an opposition group made up largely of former military officers who had broken with Saddam Hussein.

Meanwhile, a spokesman for former Governing Council Member Ahmad Chalabi demanded that Jordan open a new investigation in fraud charges that led to Chalabi's 1991 conviction in absentia in a banking scandal.

Chalabi's spokesman, Mithal al-Alusi, said the head of the Iraqi National Congress party was unfairly tried by a military court and that Chalabi can prove his innocence before a civilian panel.