3 U.S. soldiers in Iraq convoy killed by bomb

BAGHDAD, Iraq – A roadside bomb killed three American soldiers south of Baghdad on Friday as U.S. and Iraqi forces swept through a city to the north where three insurgents had been killed the day before after firing on U.S troops.

The three Americans died in the attack shortly before noon in Babil province, the U.S. military said, giving few other details. However, Iraqi police said the blast targeted a military convoy near Mahaweel, 35 miles south of Baghdad.

In Samarra, 60 miles north of the capital, American and Iraqi forces imposed a daytime curfew and searched for insurgents a day after three militants were killed after they fired on U.S. soldiers, police said.

Samarra was the scene of the Feb. 22 explosion at a Shiite shrine that enflamed sectarian tensions. It triggered reprisal attacks on Sunnis, forced tens of thousands of Iraqis to flee their homes and pushed the country to the brink of civil war.

American officials are hoping the new national unity government of Shiites, Sunnis and Kurds will eventually reduce sectarian tensions and lure disaffected Sunni Arabs away from the insurgency so U.S. and other foreign troops can begin to go home.

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki has until late this month to complete his Cabinet, the final stage for the new government. Haitham al-Husseini, a Shiite spokesman, said the Cabinet would be announced Tuesday.

The statement was made after a meeting among al-Maliki, President Jalal Talabani, a Kurd, and two top Shiite leaders. No Sunni Arabs politicians attended, and it was unclear whether the Sunnis had accepted the Tuesday date.

Six people, five of them Sunnis, were killed Friday when gunmen in three cars shot up and firebombed two small groceries in the capital’s Yarmouk district, police said. A community leader was slain by gunmen near Khalis 50 miles north of Baghdad, police said.

An Iraqi police major was assassinated in a drive-by shooting in Diwaniyah, 80 miles south of Baghdad, police said. And a Shiite cleric, Hussein Ahmed al-Mousawi, was shot and killed near his home in Baghdad.

The bodies of eight Iraqis who apparently were kidnapped and killed also were found Friday, five in Baghdad and three on the outskirts of the city, police said. Such sectarian killings by Shiite and Sunni “death squads” have become common in Iraq, especially in the capital.