BAGHDAD, Aug 18: Four US soldiers were killed in Iraq on Thursday, a day after 43 people died in rush-hour Baghdad bombings which the government said sought to create a sectarian crisis in the war-torn country. The soldiers were killed by a roadside bomb in the northern town of Samarra, the US military said, taking to around 50 the US military deaths across Iraq in August, according to an AFP tally based on Pentagon figures.

Another US military convoy was hit by a roadside bomb in Baghdad early on Thursday with Iraqi officials reporting some American casualties in the blast although the US military had no immediate comment.

“Our troops have seen American soldiers evacuating some of their wounded colleagues from the humvee after it hit the bomb,” an interior ministry official said. The total US military deaths in Iraq since the March 2003 invasion were at 1,849, according to Pentagon figures as of August 17.—AFP