U.S. troops kill 5 after bombing wrong house

BAGHDAD, Iraq -- American troops opened fire after their convoy was struck by a roadside bomb at a checkpoint south of Baghdad, killing at least two policemen and three civilians, police said Sunday, a day after the U.S. military acknowledged five people were killed when it bombed the wrong house during a search operation in northern Iraq.\nIn an apparent accident, seven Ukrainians and one Kazakh serving with the U.S.-led coalition in Iraq were killed Sunday in an explosion while loading bombs that could be used by warplanes, officials said.\nLt. Col. Artur Domanski, a Polish military spokesman in Iraq, said the explosion occurred at about noon at an ammunition dump about six miles south of Suwaira. Eleven soldiers were wounded -- seven Ukrainians and four Kazakhs, he said.\nThe owner of the house that was struck south of Mosul, Ali Yousef, said 14 people were killed when the 500-pound GPS-guided bomb hit at about 2 a.m. Saturday in the town of Aitha, 30 miles south of Mosul. An Associated Press photographer at the scene said seven children and seven adults died. The discrepancy between the death counts could not be reconciled.\nThe U.S. military later released a statement saying it regretted the loss of "possibly innocent lives" in the strike, which occurred as U.S. ground troops searched for "an anti-Iraqi force cell leader." \nAmerican troops recently sent more troops to Mosul, which has seen heavy clashes in recent weeks between insurgents and American forces.\nThe attacks come at an extremely delicate time, with Iraq roiled by violence just three weeks before elections for a national assembly. The United States has insisted that the vote go ahead on Jan. 30.\nOn Sunday, Secretary of State Colin Powell was asked how he would define success in Iraq's election, and he acknowledged concern about what would happen after the vote.\n"Success is putting in place a government that is really elected and represents all of the people of Iraq ... and creating an Iraqi security force that is able to protect the country and protect the people of Iraq," he said on ABC's "This Week."\nU.S. officials said they had no information about the shooting at the checkpoint, which occurred overnight Saturday. Interior Ministry spokesman Col. Adnan Abdul-Rahman said a U.S. convoy was hit by a roadside bomb near a police checkpoint in Yussifiyah, nine miles south of Baghdad, and troops opened fire, killing two police and three civilians.\nDr. Anmar Abdul-Hadi of the al-Yarmouk hospital said eight people were killed in the attack and 12 were wounded.\nAmerican commanders recently have said they were changing tactics in the way they respond to roadside bombings. Rather than pushing on after the blast, they now stop and try to engage the perpetrators, who might have detonated the explosives remotely.\nFew details about the deaths of the Ukrainians and Kazakh were known. Domanski said an investigation had been launched. Ukraine's Defense Ministry said soldiers were loading aviation bombs when one device exploded.\nUkraine serves in a Polish-led contingent in south central Iraq and is the fourth-largest contributor of troops to the U.S.-led war effort with 1,650 soldiers. Kazakhstan has sent a 27-strong contingent of military engineers to Iraq and is the only Central Asian nation to contribute troops to forces there.