3 U.S. soldiers die in attacks

BAGHDAD, Iraq – Insurgents ambushed two U.S. military patrols north of Baghdad on Sunday in separate attacks that killed three U.S. soldiers and an Iraqi civilian.

A roadside bomb attack on a U.S. patrol in the city of Samarra, a hotbed of violence 60 miles north of Baghdad, killed two soldiers on patrol Sunday afternoon and wounded three others, the military said.

An earlier attack on a U.S. convoy in Beiji, 90 miles south of the northern city of Mosul, began Sunday morning when a roadside bomb exploded next to the patrol, the military said.

An enemy vehicle then raced toward the convoy, with insurgents firing at the soldiers, who shot back and killed the driver, the military said.

A soldier and a civilian traveling behind the patrol were killed. A second soldier was injured and evacuated. Thick black smoke poured over the area from an oil tanker set afire in the attack.

The deaths came a day after four U.S. Marines were killed in a vehicle accident near Camp Fallujah in western Iraq. More than 875 U.S. service members have died since the beginning of military operations in Iraq.

To prevent the infiltration of foreign fighters, Syria and Iraq have agreed to set up a special force to patrol their 360-mile shared border, Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Barham Saleh said Sunday in Damascus, Syria, after meeting with Syrian President Bashar Assad.

In other developments, Iraq’s national security adviser, Mouwaffaq al-Rubaie, said Sunday the country never again will threaten its neighbors and will honor the Nuclear Nonproliferation Treaty as well as international agreements banning the use of chemical and biological weapons.

“Iraq officially declares it will be a country free of any weapons of mass destruction,” al-Rubaie told reporters during a news conference. “Iraq will never again resort to threatening its neighbors, as Saddam (Hussein) did.”

Saddam’s alleged possession of such weapons was one of President Bush’s declared reasons for invading Iraq last year. But the hunt for weapons of mass destruction has proved largely unsuccessful.

Demonstrators _ some supporting Saddam’s ousted regime, others opposed to it _ took to the streets of Iraq on Sunday.

In Baqouba, north of Baghdad, about 100 people marched through the shopping district, chanting pro-Saddam slogans, waving rifles and carrying posters of the former Iraqi leader. Meanwhile, demonstrators in Baghdad held a mock trial and execution of Saddam, hoisting an effigy from a hangman’s noose and setting it on fire.