Seven US soldiers killed in four Iraq attacks

BAGHDAD, May 23 (Reuters) Seven US soldiers were killed in four separate attacks in Iraq, most of them by roadside bombs, the US military said today.

In the worst single attack, three soldiers were killed and two were wounded when their patrol was hit by ''multiple improvised explosive devices'', the military said in a statement.

It gave no location for the attack, in which an interpreter was also wounded.

The other three attacks were in different locations around Baghdad.

Two soldiers were killed when their vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb in Baghdad province. Another three were wounded in the same attack.

One more soldier was killed and another wounded when their patrol was hit by a roadside bomb southwest of Baghdad.

In the fourth attack, a soldier was killed when his patrol was hit by small arms fire in the west of the capital.

The deaths of two Marines in western Anbar province yesterday had already been reported, taking to nine the total killed yesterday in one of the bloodiest days for the US military since the 2003 US-led invasion to topple Saddam Hussein.

Thousands of extra US and Iraqi troops are being deployed around Baghdad and other areas as part of a three-month-old security crackdown designed to drag Iraq back from the brink of all-out sectarian civil war.

REUTERS RJ RK1608