A car bomb hit a Baghdad hotel used by foreigners and US tanks fought Shiite militia yesterday.
The holiest Shiite Muslim shrine, the Imam Ali mosque in Najaf, was slightly damaged by what appeared to be rockets or mortars. Anti-American militia said several people were hurt in an incident that will upset believers across the Middle East.
Around nearby Kufa, at least 11 people died in early morning fighting, hospital staff said.
US tanks were in action before dawn south of the capital, battling Shiite Mahdi Army fighters around the town of Kufa.
At least 11 people were killed and 22 wounded, hospital staff in Kufa and the nearby holy city of Najaf said.
Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr launched an uprising last month against the US occupation. A sharp US offensive in recent days has contained the fighting to the Najaf area.
Damage to the Imam Ali shrine, dedicated to the 7th-century leader whose followers founded the Shiite branch of Islam, is a sensitive issue for the Shiite majorities in Iraq and Iran.
It was not clear which side fired the explosives. US commanders say they are doing all they can to spare holy sites.
At least two people were wounded in Baghdad, police said, when a car blew up outside the Karma hotel, frequented by foreigners and near the embassy of Australia, a close US ally in Iraq.
Iraqi witnesses also said a US military convoy had been attacked near the turbulent Sunni Muslim city of Fallujah. There was no US comment. It was not clear if there were casualties.
A soldier whose death on Monday was announced yesterday was at least the 580th American to die in combat since the invasion.
A leader of Iraq's Turkmen minority was assassinated in a drive-by shooting in the northern city of Kirkuk, police said.
Meanwhile, Iraqi interim defense minister Ali Allawi said in London yesterday that Iraq expects foreign troops to remain in the country for "months rather than years."
"In terms of time for the presence of the international forces to help us establish security and stability, I think it will be a question of months rather than years," Allawi told a joint press conference with British counterpart Geoff Hoon.
"The multinational force, in as much as its presence is needed to maintain security, will need ... to be replaced by indigenous forces, by Iraqi forces," Allawi said.
He was responding to a question about how long foreign troops might remain in the country following the handover of sovereignty by the US-led coalition on June 30.
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