Three US soldiers killed in Baghdad attacks

Three more American soldiers have died in the last 24 hours in Baghdad as guerilla attacks targeting the occupation forces showed no signs of abating.

One was killed when a bomb was thrown at his vehicle today in the north of the Iraqi capital. Another died when his convoy came under fire last night.

And a third US soldier died after being shot in the head at close range as he waited at a soft drinks stall outside Baghdad University.

US spokesman Sgt Patrick Compton said one assailant was taken into custody and another was killed after last night’s shooting attack on the convoy.

The killing of the American outside the university in broad daylight was chillingly similar to the death of Richard Wild, 24.

The British freelance journalist was killed with a single shot outside the Baghdad Museum in the city centre on Saturday.

The strikes, combined with a grenade attack on a United Nations compound in the north, raised fears that Iraq’s insurgency is getting worse.

Until now it has targeted only coalition troops and Iraqis accused of collaborating with the collaboration forces, but there are now concerns it will spread to Westerners in general.

American troops on patrol in Baghdad and other areas have been attacked several times a day, and Iraqi police and civilians perceived to be working with the occupying forces have also been hit.

In the most serious such attack, a bomb in the restive western town of Ramadi killed seven Iraqi police recruits as they graduated from a US training course on Saturday. Dozens of people were injured.

Four more Americans were wounded in the town last night when a rocket-propelled grenade was fired at their convoy. One Iraqi suspect was killed and another wounded in that attack.

US Army Maj William Thurmond said it was too early to tell whether a pattern was emerging that would suggest insurgents are targeting foreign civilians, but he said such a strategy could thwart the work of reporters and aid agencies.

“Hopefully they are isolated events and we won’t have to face them in the future,” he said. “It might work to the advantage of someone who is trying to fight the coalition.”

The killing of the British cameraman happened at around midday, while the victim was carrying no apparent sign that he was a reporter.

Mr Wild, who arrived in the country two weeks ago aiming to be a war correspondent, was killed by a single pistol shot to the base of his skull from close range, colleagues said. The assailant escaped into the crowd.

The US soldier killed yesterday at Baghdad University was also shot at close range. In another similar incident, a gunman shot and critically injured a US soldier in the neck on June 27 as he shopped on a Baghdad street.

On Saturday, insurgents fired a rocket-propelled grenade at the United Nation’s International Organisation for Migration office in Mosul, 240 miles north-west of Baghdad.

The grenade slammed into a wall and damaged several cars, said Hamid Abdel-Jabar, a spokesman for the UN special representative in Iraq.

“There’s no place for that in any civilised part of the world,” Thurmond said. “As soon as we get hold of them, they are gone. We will find them. We will attack them. And if necessary we will kill them.”

Meanwhile, the US agreed to release 11 Turkish commandos detained during a raid in northern Iraq, ending a stand-off that strained efforts by the Nato allies to repair relations frayed over the war.