Western warplanes bombed southern Iraq yesterday, in an attack Iraqi officials said killed four people at oil company offices but which the US military said was aimed at Iraqi air defences.

The strike came as UN arms experts conducted a fourth day of inspections, examining an agricultural facility previously linked to a biological weapons programme and military complexes associated with alleged nuclear programmes near Baghdad.

Residents of the southern port city of Basra told Reuters by telephone Western planes bombed administrative offices of the state-run Southern Oil Company on the outskirts of the city at around noon. The company supervises part of Iraq's oil exports under the oil-for-food deal with the United Nations.

An Iraqi military spokesman said four people died and 27 were wounded in the attack. An oil company official said the casualties were company employees and passers-by.

The military spokesman said the planes also attacked two other civilian targets in the south. He said Iraqi air defence units had fired on the planes.