A third US navy sailor died from wounds sustained in a suicide boat attack on Iraq's Basra offshore oil terminal, the US Navy's Bahrain-based Fifth Fleet said this evening.
"A US coast guardsman has died from injuries sustained when a dhow exploded as he and six other coalition sailors attempted to board it yesterday evening," the Fifth Fleet said in a statement.
"Two US Navy sailors were killed and three other US sailors and one coast guardsman were wounded. They are recovering at a military hospital in Kuwait," it added.
Suicide bombers launched three coordinated boat attacks on Iraq's key southern Basra oil export terminal yesterday.
Coalition officials said there was no damage to the terminal through which Iraq ships nearly all the 1.9 million barrels of oil it exports per day, but the installation was shut down for an undisclosed period.
The boat attacks capped a bloody day for Iraq.
Five US soldiers were among more than 40 other people killed in attacks elsewhere in the country, the latest spate of violence in the bloodiest month for US-led forces since Saddam Hussein was toppled over a year ago.
In one of the worst incidents, at least 13 Iraqis were killed and 30 wounded when mortar bombs struck a busy market in the Shi'ite Muslim area of Sadr City in Baghdad, witnesses and hospital sources said.
The five US soldiers were killed in a rocket attack on their base just north of Baghdad, a US military spokesman said. Six soldiers were wounded, three critically.