Three US soldiers killed in Iraq

Three US soldiers have been killed in two separate incidents in Iraq, the US military has said.

A roadside bomb targeting a passing US military convoy killed one civilian and wounded two just outside the heavily fortified Green Zone compound in central Bagdad.

The explosion shook buildings and was one of the loudest heard in the capital in weeks after a lull in attacks that had become almost a daily occurrence earlier this year.

Elsewhere, two US soldiers died and four were wounded on Tuesday when they were hit by a roadside bomb in Diyala, northeast of the capital, the military said in a statement.

In the volatile city of Mosul, around 240 miles north of Baghdad, another US soldier was shot and killed.

The deaths take the total of US soldiers killed in Iraq to 3,863, according to the independent website icasualties.org.

Around 860 US troops have been killed so far in 2007, the worst annual total since the US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein in March 2003.

Attacks in Baghdad and elsewhere have gradually declined since US President George W Bush sent extra troops to Iraq in a last-ditch bid to stop the country from spiralling into sectarian civil war.

The offensive began in mid-February, when Iraq was gripped by multiple bombings and shooting attacks almost every day, and became fully operational in mid-June.

On Tuesday, the US said 3,000 troops are being sent home from Diyala, but the province remains one of the problem areas in Iraq for the US military.

While the overall number of troops in Iraq would drop from its current level of about 162,000, the number in Diyala would remain the same, with the 3,000 leaving to be replaced by another brigade already in Iraq, the military said.

© Independent Television News Limited 2007. All rights reserved.