Iraqi fighters attacked an American patrol north of Baghdad and a gunbattle left a soldier and three fighters dead, the US Army said Thursday.
The fighting took place Wednesday near the town of Taji, some 20 kilometers north of Baghdad, said Brig. Gen. Mark Kimmitt, the U.S. military's deputy director of operations. A U.S. soldier was also injured, he added, according to The AP.
Elsewhere, another U.S. soldier died in a bomb blast north of Baghdad on Thursday. Two others were wounded when a homemade bomb exploded near Baqouba, the military said. The soldiers went to the area after Iraqi security notified them that a homemade bomb had been found.
Meanwhile, the Army admitted that an increase in suicides among American troops in Iraq last summer pushed the overall suicide rate there to much higher than for the entire Army.
This was among the conclusions of a mental health assessment team that met with soldiers in Iraq and Kuwait between August and October 2003, according to The AP.
There were at least 24 suicides among American troops in Iraq and Kuwait during 2003, according to the Army's count.
That equates to a suicide rate of 17.3 per 100,000 soldiers, compared with a rate of 12.8 for the entire Army in 2003 and an average rate of 11.9 for the Army during the 1995-2002 period, according to officials familiar with the mental health study.
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