US-led forces battled Shia militiamen loyal to a wanted cleric in the holy city of Kerbala today after an ambush destroyed at least one military vehicle.
One coalition soldier and five Iraqi civilians were wounded in the one-hour clash.
Mehdi Army militiamen, firing assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, ambushed a military convoy in the centre of Kerbala.
A spokesman for the Polish-led multinational division in charge of south-central Iraq confirmed there had been exchanges some 500 to 600 metres from the town hall after one military vehicle was hit in the ambush.
The Mehdi Army militia is loyal to Shia cleric Moqtada al-Sadr, whom US forces want to arrest for alleged involvement in the killing of another Shia cleric.
Some 2,000 US soldiers are deployed outside Najaf, Iraq's holiest Shia city, where Sadr is holed up.
Sadr said today he could unleash suicide bombers if US forces attacked Najaf, and called on the whole nation to unite to expel Iraq's occupiers. His supporters in parts of Baghdad and towns in the south rose up against the occupation earlier this month.