At least five people, three of whom were US soldiers, have died in the latest violence in Iraq.
A roadside bomb killed two civilians in central Baghdad today and wounded three just outside the heavily fortified Green Zone that houses the US embassy and government ministries.
The explosion, which shook buildings in the Green Zone, was close to a heavily guarded checkpoint where hundreds of Iraqis who work inside the sprawling complex queue every morning.
It was one of the loudest blasts heard in the capital in weeks after a lull in attacks that had become almost a daily occurrence earlier this year, witnesses said.
The US military said one of its convoys had been the target of the bomb but gave no information about possible casualties. Police said at least one vehicle had been hit.
Meanwhile, three US soldiers were killed in two separate incidents in northern Iraq yesterday, the US military has confirmed.
Two US soldiers died and four were wounded when they were hit by a roadside bomb in restive Diyala province northeast of Baghdad yesterday, the military said in a statement. Roadside bombs are by far the biggest killers of US troops in Iraq.
Another US soldier was shot and killed near the volatile city of Mosul, 390 km north of Baghdad.
Their deaths took the total of US soldiers killed in Iraq to 3,863, according to the independent Web site icasualties.org, which tracks military and civilian casualties in Iraq.