At least 33 people were killed in bombings in Iraq, 20 of them Iraqi soldiers whose convoy was attacked north of Tikrit, President Jalal Talabani's party said.
The soldiers were traveling between Tikrit and the oil- refining city of Baiji, the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan said on its Web site. Seven civilians died in a car bombing in the northeastern city of Muqdadiyah, and four others were killed in Baghdad's Karradah district. Two police officers died in the northern city of Kirkuk, the PUK said.
A U.K. soldier died today from injuries sustained when a mortar round hit his position in the southern city of Basra, according to a statement read by a Ministry of Defence spokesman. A U.S. service member was killed in action yesterday, the military said today in an e-mailed statement.
U.S.-led coalition commanders are sending 3,700 soldiers to Baghdad from posts around Iraq following the failure of Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki's initial plan to pacify the capital. Violence between Iraq's Shiite and Sunni Muslim populations has intensified since the February bombing of a Shiite mosque, adding to the bloodshed from an insurgency aimed at coalition and Iraqi troops. More than 14,000 Iraqis were killed in the year through June, the United Nations said.
Agence France-Presse said the Karradah blast killed 10 police officers and soldiers. The district of the capital was targeted in a similar attack last week that left eight cars in flames, Talabani's party said.
Letter to Bush
Gunmen yesterday kidnapped as many as 32 people in an attack in central Baghdad, said an official with the Iraqi-American Chamber of Commerce and Industry, whose workers were among those seized. They raided a telecommunications company next to the trade chamber's headquarters.
Top congressional Democrats called on President George W. Bush to begin withdrawing U.S. troops this year as opposition to their presence in Iraq mounts. In a July 30 letter to Bush, 12 Democrats, including Senate Democratic leader Harry Reid of Nevada and House Democratic leader Nancy Pelosi of California, said Iraq had "exploded in violence," and that the U.S. has no clear policy.
"Despite the latest evidence that your administration lacks a coherent strategy to stabilize Iraq and achieve victory, there has been virtually no diplomatic effort to resolve sectarian differences, no regional effort to establish a broader security framework, and no attempt to revive a struggling reconstruction effort," the Democrats wrote.
The U.S. service member who died yesterday was killed when a bomb detonated beside a military convoy south of Baghdad, the military said. A second service member, assigned to the same unit, the 16th Corps Support Group, was wounded in the attack. No further details were given.
--With reporting by Alex Morales and Jonathan Tirone in London and Laura Litvan in Washington.
To contact the reporters on this story: Patrick Donahue in Berlin at (49) (30) 70010 6220 or pdonahue1bloomberg.net; Caroline Alexander in Jerusalem at (972) (2) 625 0061 or calexander1bloomberg.net.
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Peter Torday at (44) (20) 7330 7539 or ptordaybloomberg.net.