Grenade attack wounds two US soldiers in Iraq

TIKRIT, Iraq - A rocket-propelled grenade and gun attack on a US convoy north of Baghdad wounded two American soldiers overnight, the US military said.

Lieutenant Colonel William MacDonald of the 4th Infantry Division said the convoy was attacked near Balad, a town in the "Sunni Triangle" north and west of Baghdad where support for fugitive dictator Saddam Hussein remains strong.

At least seven Iraqis were killed on Monday in a blast at an ammunition dump north of Saddam's home town of Tikrit. MacDonald said US troops investigating the blast found one body at the scene and Iraqi police later found a further six.

The identities of those killed were not known, but soldiers said the ammunition dump had been often targeted by looters.

In Ramadi, another Sunni stronghold west of Baghdad, witnesses said a US convoy was attacked with rocket-propelled grenades on Tuesday morning and at least one soldier was wounded. A US Army spokesman had no immediate information.

On Monday afternoon an American soldier was killed by a bomb in Baghdad. Attacks on occupying troops have killed 61 US and seven British soldiers since the start of May.

In Tikrit, where the 4th Infantry Division has mounted scores of raids hunting Saddam loyalists blamed for the guerrilla attacks, US soldiers opened fire on an ambulance during a battle with gunmen in another vehicle.

"Last night we had a vehicle with armed men apparently using an ambulance to mask its movements after curfew," said Lieutenant Colonel Steve Russell.

"Reports from Iraqis and also our soldiers said the vehicle engaged our soldiers from the vicinity of the ambulance. Our soldiers returned fire resulting in the wounding of an Iraqi male in the ambulance and the slight wounding of a second man."

Human rights groups say Iraqi civilians have been killed or wounded by US soldiers in several incidents, either mistakenly shot or caught in the crossfire during battles.

On Sunday, award-winning Reuters cameraman Mazen Dana, a Palestinian, was shot dead by a US soldier while filming outside a prison on the western outskirts of Baghdad. The US military said the shooting was a "tragic accident."

In northern Iraq, engineers worked to repair the main oil export pipeline to Turkey, a crucial lifeline for the floundering economy. The pipeline reopened last Wednesday for the first time since the war, but was shut down just two days later after an attack by saboteurs set it ablaze.

Before the war, the sabotaged pipeline pumped 700,000 barrels per day to Turkey, nearly a third of Iraq's total prewar export capacity of 2.2 million barrels a day.

Sabotage and theft of power cables have also caused repeated electricity blackouts in the south of Iraq and have badly hit exports from the country's southern oilfields.

Paul Bremer, the US governor of Iraq, said that sabotage had cost the economy "literally billions of dollars."

The US-led administration in Iraq is relying on income from Iraq's vast oil reserves -- the world's second largest -- to provide the billions of dollars needed to rebuild the country. International donors will also be asked to pledge billions in aid at a conference in Madrid in October.

Herald Feature: Iraq