Iraqi forces have killed 43 US and British soldiers in the past 36 hours, Iraq's Information Minister is claiming as fierce fighting around several key cities in continues this evening.
"We have shot down four Apaches [helicopters], two Predator drones and killed 43 US and British soldiers," Mr Mohammed Said al-Sahhaf told a press conference in Baghdad.
He said 13 coalition tanks, eight troop transports and six armoured cars had been also been destroyed over the past 36 hours.
His claim came as US and Iraqi forces engaged in a number of battles south of Baghdad today. The US says the Iraqis sustained a number of casualties.
Fighter jets, tanks, helicopters and artillery were called in against Iraqi positions near the town of Imam Aiyub on the east bank of the Euphrates, 70 miles south of the capital.
Captain Brad Loudon of the 2nd Battalion 70th Armored Regiment said the Iraqis hit back with tanks, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades.
"Two enemy tanks have been destroyed and a host of [Iraqi] infantry," he said, without giving any number. He said that "at least one" American was killed.
Elsewhere, US forces have begun their first serious battle with Iraq's elite Republican Guard around the city of Karbala, south of Baghdad. Fighting erupted overnight between the US Army's Third Infantry Division and Republican Guard units southeast of the city.
Up to 200 Iraqis were killed, wounded or captured, US officers said.
The battle around Karbala, a Shi'ite Muslim holy city about 50 miles south of Baghdad, came as US armoured units finalised plans for a decisive thrust toward the capital.
The 20,000-strong Third Infantry Division, the heavy armoured force spearheading the US-led invasion, has concentrated near the Euphrates valley town of Najaf, 95 miles south of Baghdad.
US Apache helicopters from the 101st Airborne Division, as well as British and US warplanes, have been targeting the area around Karbala where the Republican Guard's armoured Medina division is thought to be lying in wait.
US special forces are also reportedly in control of movement across Iraq's western desert. They are stopping people from travelling in the area, in some cases preventing them from entering the country, a senior US commander said.
Brigadier General Vincent Brooks characterized the operation as "area denial" and said it was mainly aimed at preventing people from straying into a combat zone.
But US troops are also on a higher alert level following a suicide car bombing at a checkpoint in southern Iraq on Saturday that killed four US soldiers.
In the south of the country, fighting between British and Iraqi forces has abated after a day of ferocious engagements as the attempt to take Iraq's second city, Basra, continues.
British forces attacked the outskirts of the town today but their advance is slow as they await reinforcements before making a major push.
Commanders said 600 soldiers backed by tanks and armoured vehicles tried to fight their way through the neighbouring town of Abu al Khasib, 12 miles southeast of Basra.
British artillery pounded the western suburbs of the city, according to the Arabic news channel Al-Jazeera, which showed live pictures of clouds of smoke and debris said to be concentrated on an area four miles from Basra's centre.
The station's correspondent in the city said irregulars from the Saddam Fedayeen and Al-Quds militias and paramilitaries from the ruling Ba'ath Party are the sole visible Iraqi forces in the city centre.
Mr Marcus Deville, a civilian spokesman for the British forces, said: "We are holding positions on the outskirts of Basra .. We are conducting aggressive patrols specifically targeting Ba'ath party personnel to drive a wedge between the regime and the people and convince them that we are there for the people."
It was also announced that British soldiers delivering humanitarian rations seized six suspected militiamen with money and guns on the main road to Al Zubayr a town outseide Basra where come of the fiercest fighting of the British operation has been reported. Meanhile, the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said it had begun visiting Iraqi prisoners of war captured by the coalition forces. A team of 15 delegates, including a doctor and six interpreters, today visited a camp in southern Iraq, the Geneva-based organisation said in a statement.
Under its mandate as guardian of the 1949 Geneva Conventions, the ICRC carries out private visits to check on the treatment of prisoners of war and to pass on messages to their families.
Agencies