Roadside bomb kills GI

BAGHDAD - A roadside bomb killed a U.S. soldier in Baghdad's Shiite slum of Sadr City yesterday, while an Iraqi died when a bicycle-riding suicide bomber blew himself up amid a mass rally against Israel's airstrikes on Gaza.

The two attacks were demonstrations of the violence that still flares up in Iraq as the government prepares to take responsibility for security from the U.S. military in a few days.

A spokesman for the U.S. military, Army Capt. Charles Calio, said that the soldier was killed by a roadside bomb that targeted an American convoy. He said that there were no other casualties. The name of the soldier was being withheld pending notification of family.

In the northern city of Mosul, 16 people in the crowd of about 1,300 protesters were wounded in the attack in the city center, a police officer said.

U.S. and Iraqi forces continue to battle al Qaeda and other insurgents in Mosul, Iraq's third- largest city, where economic and political problems persist. The issues are complicated by Kurdish-Arab tensions in the city.

There has been no claim of responsibility for the attack on the Mosul demonstration, the local police officer said. The rally was one of several throughout Iraq yesterday to protest the Israeli attacks and demand a strong response from Arab governments.

Also yesterday, police in Fallujah said that a bomb exploded on the outskirts of the city, killing two civilians and wounding four others.

A police officer said that the bomb exploded in a parking lot where farmers and other merchants gather to buy and sell goods. Calio, the U.S. military spokesman, confirmed the casualty toll. *