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Six American and four British troops were killed in attacks across Iraq, coalition forces announced on Thursday, as a US helicopter crashed south of Baghdad and insurgents ambushed Iraqi soldiers.
The bloody 24 hours for foreign troops and the local army the Americans and British are trying to train, came with preparations underway for Iraqi security troops to take control of the fourth province in the Shiite south.
The British soldiers and a civilian interpreter in the same vehicle were killed outside the southern city of Basra in a complex attack involving a roadside bomb, small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades.
Two of four Britons were women from the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps and the Intelligence Corps, the ministry of defence said in London.
Their deaths bring to four the number of British female personnel killed since the start of the US-led invasion in March 2003.
Another soldier was seriously wounded in what was the deadliest attack against British forces based in Iraq since November, when four servicemen were killed in a bomb attack on their boat patrol in the Shatt al-Arab waterway.
“It is with deep regret that we can confirm that four British soldiers and a civilian interpreter were killed in a roadside bomb attack against a Warrior patrol west of Basra this morning,” said the British ministry of defence.
British Lieutenant Colonel Kevin Stratford-Wright said the patrol repelled an initial attack from gunmen, hitting at least one assailant with return fire, before moving out of the urban area and coming under attack.
West of Basra, the unit was hit by a roadside bomb, followed up with small-arms fire and rocket-propelled grenades, he told AFP by telephone from the British headquarters in southern Iraq.
“During that (roadside bomb) attack the five people were killed, all of whom were in the same vehicle. A further soldier who was in the vehicle is very seriously wounded,” he said.
In London, Prime Minister Tony Blair mourned the deaths of the four soldiers albeit as Britain celebrated the return of 15 sailors and marines detained by Iran.
“Just as we rejoice at the return of our 15 personnel, so today we also grieve and mourn for the loss of our soldiers in Basra who were killed as a result of a terrorist act,” he said.
In Baghdad, the US military also announced that six soldiers had been killed over the past two days as the rising body count increases domestic American pressure for troops to be withdrawn from Iraq.
Four soldiers were killed on Wednesday by roadside bombs in southern Baghdad and north of the capital, and two more troops were shot dead by insurgents in eastern parts of the capital on Tuesday and Wednesday.
Their deaths bring the US military's losses in Iraq since the invasion to 3,261, according to an AFP tally based on Pentagon statistics. In the same four years, 140 British soldiers have been killed in Iraq.
On Thursday, four personnel on board a US army helicopter were wounded and evacuated when it crashed south of Baghdad.
Earlier reports said the Black Hawk crashed after being hit by ground fire in the Sunni stronghold of Latifiyah, south of Baghdad, but the military said only that the incident was “under investigation.”
Ten US helicopters — including two operated by private security firms — have now come down in Iraq since January 20, most because of hostile fire.
In Baghdad, where there has been a marked decline in sectarian killings since Iraqi and US forces launched an armed crackdown in February, a suicide bomber killed an Iraqi journalist in a bomb attack.
The bomber blew up a dump truck outside the office of Baghdad Television, a 24-hour channel owned by the Sunni Iraqi Islamic Party, killing the network's deputy bureau chief Thaer Ahmed Jabr and wounding 12 other employees.
Police also found the body of an Iraqi woman journalist, Khamael Muhsin, who was a prominent television newsreader during the time of Saddam Hussein and whom had been kidnapped one day earlier, a media rights group said.
In northern Iraq, gunmen killed at least seven Iraqi soldiers near the city of Mosul, security officials told AFP, where the Baghdad crackdown has already been in action two days. One official said 10 soldiers had died.
The violence is to be discussed at a gathering of ministers from Iraq, its neighbours and other leading powers in early May, Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari told AFP.
“At this stage I do not want to reveal all my cards… about the venue, the countries… we will make an announcement in the next couple of days,” he said.
Turkey is willing to host the conference, which could see US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice sit alongside her counterparts from Iran and Syria, which Washington accuses of aiding insurgents in Iraq — charges they deny.
