Iraq rebels die in border clash

American troops have reported killing 11 insurgents in fighting near Iraq's border with Syria, on a day of violence which saw at least six other deaths.

Marines came under mortar fire from militants in an empty school near the town of Haditha, the US military said.

The insurgents died after forces bombed the building, setting off explosions from the ammunition stored inside.

A car bomb near Baghdad killed five and gunmen shot a bodyguard of Iraqi Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi.

The bodyguard died when a convoy, in which Mr Chalabi was apparently not travelling at the time, came under fire south of Baghdad.

Three other people were wounded, police said. The location of the attack was not clear.

Mr Chalabi was one of the best-known Iraqi opposition figures in the West at the time of the invasion in 2003.

Checkpoints targeted

The bomb attack near the town of Haswa, about 50km (30 miles) south of Baghdad, left two civilians dead and two policemen injured.

Violence has increased recently with Iraqi police and army checkpoints often targeted by insurgents.

They accuse them of being collaborators with the US-led occupation. But many civilians have been killed as well.

On Saturday, two British security contractors were killed in an attack in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.

And police in northern Iraq said the number of people who died when a suicide bomber blew himself up at an army recruitment centre in Mosul on Friday had risen to more than 40.