Suicide bomber kills 1; 2 US soldiers die in Iraq

[January 03, 2011]  BAGHDAD (AP) -- A suicide bomber detonated an explosives-laden car northeast of Baghdad, killing one passerby and injuring 33, police and hospital officials said.

In two other, separate incidents Monday, a policeman was killed in a drive-by shooting in Baghdad and a Christian woman was shot to death by armed men who broke into her house, police officers said.

The predawn attack on the Christian woman's house was the latest in a string of attacks on Iraq's dwindling Christian community since 68 people died in the October siege of a Baghdad church. A police official said initial findings point to robbery, but he did not rule out the possibility that the woman was targeted because she was Christian.

The U.S. military, meanwhile, reported that two American soldiers had Sunday in central Iraq. It gave no further details on the dead soldiers, whose names were withheld pending notification of next of kin.

Their deaths raise to at least 4,431 the number of U.S. military personnel who have died in Iraq since the war began in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count.

The U.S. ended combat operations in Iraq in September. About 50,000 American troops remain, assisting and training Iraqi security forces who are to take over full responsibility for protecting the country by year's end, when the U.S. is to withdraw all forces.

[Associated Press; By BARBARA SURK]

Associated Press writers Sinan Salaheddin and Saad Abdul-Kadir contributed to this report.

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