Iraqis shot dead after US convoy bombed

BAGHDAD -- A day after Iraqi civilians were killed in a mistaken US bombing near Mosul, more civilians died in a shooting near Baghdad yesterday in which circumstances were unclear but American troops were initially blamed.

Colonel Adnan Abdul Rahman, a spokesman for Iraq's Interior Ministry, said early yesterday that a US convoy was struck by a roadside bomb in Yussifiyah, about 10 miles south of Baghdad, and that US forces responded by opening fire, mistakenly killing two Iraqi police officers and three civilians.

But Rahman later told The New York Times that he had not attributed the deaths to American fire and that it was not yet clear who fired the fatal shots. Early today, a US military spokeswoman said she had no information about the shooting.

US military officials acknowledged Saturday that their forces had dropped a 500-pound bomb on the wrong house near Mosul, killing at least five Iraqi civilians.

Ten soldiers from the US-led coalition died yesterday. Seven from Ukraine and one from Kazakhstan were killed in an apparent ammunition dump accident yesterday afternoon, and a US soldier and a Marine were killed in separate attacks. In addition, the police chief in north-central Samarra was assassinated.

While Rahman said five Iraqis were killed in the checkpoint shooting yesterday, Dr. Anmar Abdul-Hadi, a physician at the al-Yarmouk hospital in Baghdad, said eight people were killed and 12 were wounded, The Associated Press reported.

There was a dispute as well regarding the casualty figures in Saturday's erroneous bombing. US military officials acknowledged that five people were mistakenly killed in the blast near Mosul, but some reports indicated that as many as 14 people may have died.

The reports of mistaken attacks on civilians are being made at a particularly delicate time, with millions of Iraqis considering whether to vote in the Jan. 30 election. US and Iraqi leaders have been trying to emphasize that the security situation in most of the country is such that it will be safe to cast a ballot.

Colonel Dana Pittard, commander of the Third Brigade of the First Infantry Division, which oversees operations in heavily Sunni-populated Baqubah, said he has been making personal pleas to Sunni leaders to take part in the election. Iraq's largest Sunni party has called for a boycott of the vote.

''They don't think this election offers them anything to vote for," said Pittard of the Sunni leaders.

Pittard said the election will be a success in his area of operation if 200,000 of the 1.8 million people living in Baqubah and the surrounding area cast a vote.

With the election less than three weeks away, insurgent attacks have escalated, and many top Republican leaders in Washington are now warning that the election will not be a panacea.

Senate majority leader Bill Frist, Republican of Tennessee, who visited Baghdad with a congressional delegation Saturday, said it was important not to set expectations too high for the election. He added that the torrid pace of the insurgency would probably continue through the election.

During an interview on ABC's ''This Week" yesterday, Secretary of State Colin L. Powell said he was concerned about what would happen after the election.

''Success is putting in place a government that is really elected and represents all the people of Iraq . . . and creating an Iraqi security force that is able to protect the country and protect the people of Iraq," Powell said.

In the coalition deaths yesterday, a soldier with Task Force Baghdad was killed by a roadside bomb, and a Marine died in Anbar Province, according to the US military, which released few details.

Just outside Samarra, a tumultuous city north of Baghdad, gunmen killed the city's police chief, Mohammed al-Badri, as he traveled in his car, Reuters reported.

The seven Ukrainians and the Kazakh were killed in an accidental explosion at an ammunition storage point near the southern city of Suwaira. Eleven other Ukrainian and Kazakh soldiers were wounded.

In Kiev, Ukraine's Defense Ministry said the soldiers were loading aviation bombs when one of the devices exploded, news agencies reported. US military officials said in a statement yesterday that the explosion occurred while the soldiers were cleaning an ammunition area.

Ukraine, with a force of 1,650 soldiers in Iraq, serves alongside Polish soldiers in the south-central part of the country.

Before the accident, nine Ukrainians had died in the war, including three in combat.

The decision by leaders in Kiev to send troops to Iraq was largely unpopular. In response to the new deaths, the Ukraine parliament approved a resolution that demanded outgoing President Leonid Kuchma withdraw troops.

President-elect Victor Yushchenko's press office released a statement underlining his commitment to withdrawing troops.