At least six foreign soldiers were killed and 27 injured in a series of attacks on US-allied forces and Iraqi targets in the southern city of Kerbala today.
Hospital officials in Kerbala said at least seven Iraqi civilians and police were also killed and 80 were wounded.
"There were six coalition soldiers...killed," Major Ralph Manos, an officer with the Polish-led multinational force based in the region, told journalists.
He declined to give the soldiers' nationalities, but Bulgaria confirmed four of its soldiers had been killed in Kerbala and a Thai foreign ministry spokesman said two Thai soldiers had died in a bomb attack at their military base.
The commander of the multi-national force in the region, General Andrzej Tyszkiewicz, said the attackers used four suicide car bombs, mortars and machine-guns against two bases and the town council building.
"We face an enemy which does not respect any values," Bulgarian deputy defence minister Ilko Dimitrov told a news conference in the Bulgarian capital, Sofia.
Dimitrov said that as well as the deaths, at least 27 Bulgarian troops were injured when a car bomb hit the Bulgarian military headquarters in the city.