Premature explosion kills 18 in Iraq

BAGHDAD — Insurgents preparing to attack a U.S. military base in Baghdad accidentally killed themselves and more than a dozen civilians Wednesday when their rocket-loaded truck exploded in a residential area.

Three U.S. soldiers also were fatally shot Wednesday in Hawija, north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. Their deaths brought to at least 4,090 the number of U.S. military personnel who have died in the Iraq war since it began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

Later in the day, a second car bomb killed seven people, including three members of an elite police commando unit, in the central Baghdad neighborhood of Jadriya. Witnesses and police officers at the scene said a parked red Volkswagen Passat exploded as a police patrol truck was passing by.

The attacks appeared to signal a renewed insurgent campaign against Iraqi police.

The rockets that blew up were the same Katyusha-type missiles that Shiite militias often fire at Baghdad's Green Zone from Sadr City, the huge Shiite Muslim enclave, Lt. Col. Steve Stover said. The series of powerful explosions occurred in the Shaab neighborhood bordering Sadr City. The truck was fitted with ramps to launch the rockets, he said.

The misfire left behind a scene of mayhem and traumatized residents. They said the heavy, loglike rockets were flung from the truck and sent spinning down the street. One hit a parked minibus and exploded.

The blasts collapsed about a dozen homes into piles of brick.

The militants were apparently trying to attack a military base about 800 yards from the site, Stover said. He said that the U.S. military counted 18 dead at the scene and that 29 were wounded. No U.S. soldiers were harmed, he said.

An Iraqi police spokesman, Col. Tariq Rzoqy, said 15 people had died and more than 50 were wounded. He said the death toll might rise as the police sifted through the debris.

Compiled from The New York Times, Los Angeles Times and The Associated Press