Six Iraqi soldiers killed at army post

Baghdad/Najaf: Iraqi police said at least six Iraqi soldiers were killed and five wounded when a suicide truck bomb exploded at their army post north of Baghdad. Two civilians were also killed in a barrage of gunfire that followed, they said.

The blast went off at a railway station in Mishada, a town 30 kilometres (20 miles) north of the capital, an officer said on condition of anonymity because he was not authorised to release the information. It destroyed half the building and ignited a fire, he said.

Checkpoint

Most of the victims had been setting up a new checkpoint near the station, along the Baghdad-Mosul highway, police said. The Iraqi Army had recently taken over the station, in preparation for securing the area ahead of a Shiite Muslim march next week, which has since been postponed.

Radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Al Sadr has postponed a march by his followers to the northern Sunni town of Samarra called to protest the destruction of a revered shrine there, a top aide said yesterday.

Assad Al Nasseri, a Shiite imam and Sadr loyalist, cited one of the reasons for the postponement as being the government's refusal to secure the route. On Thursday Iraqi government urged Shiites to ignore Sadr's call, insisting the road to Samarra was full of "terrorists."