News From Iraq

-A struggle between Sunni and Shiite Muslim extremists seeking to control Baghdad has eclipsed the Sunni insurgency against U.S.-led coalition forces and is spreading to other parts of the country, the Pentagon said yesterday. Sectarian violence in Iraq this week has killed more than 300 Iraqis, including 64 in a series of coordinated attacks Thursday night in Baghdad, which has been the target of a U.S.-Iraqi campaign to improve security. DETAILS

-The Iraqi government has formally taken over the notorious Abu Ghraib prison, site of an abuse scandal by US soldiers, a government spokesman said on Saturday. DETAILS

Following are security and other developments in Iraq reported on Saturday:

KERBALA - Fourteen South Asian pilgrims were ambushed and killed on their way to Shi'ite Muslim sites in Iraq, hospital, Interior Ministry and army sources said. A hospital official said they were killed three days ago.

BAGHDAD - Police said they found the bodies of four Iraqis in the capital.

KERBALA - Gunmen attacked a bus carrying guards for Shi'ite shrines just north of Kerbala killing three and wounding eight, police said.

MAHAWEEL - A car bomb near a police station in Mahaweel in Babil province, 75 km (45 miles) south of Baghdad, killed three people and wounded 14, police said.

BAGHDAD - Three bombs killed two Iraqi civilians and wounded 19, including three policemen, in an attack near a police convoy in Baghdad's Waziriya district, police sources said.

BAGHDAD - A U.S. air strike on a building killed three members of a suspected mortar crew near Yusufiya south of Baghdad on Friday. Some civilians may have been wounded in the bombing, the U.S. military said in a statement.

BAGHDAD - Gunmen attacked an Iraqi security firm in the western Baghdad Jihad neighbourhood killing two and wounding eight, an Interior Ministry source said.

BAGHDAD - A bomb planted inside an apartment building in Baghdad's mainly Shi'ite New Baghdad district wounded three people, police said.

MAHMUDIYA - A roadside bomb wounded two policemen in the town of Mahmudiya, just south of Baghdad, police said.