US army kills 25 rebels in fierce fight

US troops backed by warplanes killed 25 guerillas in the northern Iraqi city of Mosul yesterday after facing a fierce coordinated assault by two suicide bombs and dozens of insurgents, the military said.

The brazen rebel assault illustrated the increasing boldness of insurgents in the city, following a suicide attack on a Mosul base last week that killed 22 people including 18 Americans - the deadliest single attack on Americans in Iraq since the start of the war to oust Saddam Hussein.

Witnesses said the fighting began when a suicide bomber detonated a fuel truck outside a house in Mosul that has been occupied as a combat outpost by US troops since last month.

Lieutenant Colonel Paul Hastings, US military spokesman in Mosul, said a patrol responding to the blast was attacked by a second suicide car bomb, and also had to deal with several roadside bombs before reaching the combat outpost.

Around 50 insurgents then attacked the outpost with assault rifles, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades, Lieut-Col Hastings said.

"Close air support was called in. Initial estimates are 25 enemy killed," Lieut-Col Hastings said.

He said 15 US troops were wounded in the clashes.

Security collapsed in Mosul last month when rebels overran several police stations in the city, 390 km north of Baghdad, and most of the city's police fled their posts.

The US military has conceded it is not in control of some areas and plans to send thousands more troops to the city ahead of Iraq's elections on January 30.

Attacks this week on police and other Iraqi security forces have left dozens dead in a sign that the Sunni insurgency, freshly endorsed by Osama bin Laden, remains potent despite US offensives intended to protect the election.

In Baghdad, at least 28 people were killed overnight when insurgents detonated three-quarters of a tonne of explosives in a house that police were raiding, flattening neighbouring homes.

Six policemen were among the dead and four officers were missing, an Interior Ministry spokesman said. Witnesses saw at least one more dead woman dug from the rubble of nearby houses razed by the massive blast. At least 21 people were wounded.

On Monday, an audio tape purportedly from bin Laden endorsed Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi as the al Qaeda leader in Iraq, and declared holy war on US and Iraqi forces trying to safeguard the election.

US President George W. Bush said bin Laden's message underlined the importance of the election, which he said pitted the desire for democracy and freedom against the militant's "dark vision" of oppression and bloodshed.

"It's very important that these elections proceed," he told reporters in Crawford, Texas, where he is on vacation.

"The task at hand is to provide as much security as possible for the election officials as well as for the people inside cities like Mosul to encourage them to express their will."

Fresh fighting also erupted yesterday in the town of Samarra, north of Baghdad. US helicopters circled and gunfire could be heard. Shops were shut and the area was deserted.

Four men in police and National Guard uniforms were found dead in Yusufiya, south of Baghdad. One had been shot, the others beheaded.