| TWO Iraqi children were killed and 23 people injured in overnight clashes between US soldiers and militiamen in the Baghdad Shi'ite neighbourhood of Sadr City, medics and the US military said today. "We received the bodies of two young children and admitted 23 wounded people over the course of Thursday evening, including two women," said doctor Hasan Najim of the Sadr City general hospital. A US military spokesman said assailants, believed to be militiamen loyal to Shi'ite radical leader Moqtada Sadr, targeted US troops with rocket-propelled grenades as they conducted regular patrols in the battlezone neighbourhood last night. "Yes, we did have clashes ... we returned fire," said the spokesman, Captain Brian O'Malley. Asked about the two children caught up in the clashes, O'Malley said two young boys were injured, one critically, when insurgents launched eight mortar rounds on the US base outside Sadr City yesterday afternoon. "The mortars missed (the base) completely but hit two boys on bicycles," he said. |