An explosion near a mosque as a US convoy drove by left several Iraqis dead and wounded at least one US soldier hurt and covered in blood in Baghdad, Iraqi witnesses said. Sweets seller Ahmed Ali, 30, said: "At 9:30 this morning a convoy of two American vehicles passed outside my shop. I saw one American soldier badly wounded and covered in blood." "When it exploded the street was blocked with traffic. People in a small truck were killed or wounded as well as some passers-by. The place was packed and all shops open and people selling their wares on the pavement." Iraqi volunteers and ambulances ferried the casualties to nearby hospitals while the US convoy drove off. The US army had no immediate comment on the blast, which went off near a traffic light about 200 metres (yards) from the Samarrai mosque used by Sunnis. The force of the blast uprooted a tree and smashed windows in surrounding buildings. **Attack on Police Station in Ramadi*** Iraqi resistance fighters attacked a police station in western Iraq and a mine blew up a US military vehicle in Baghdad yesterday as US troops in the main northern city of Mosul were on the trail of the head of the "death squads" of Saddam Hussein's feared intelligence services. Three civilians and two policemen were wounded in the attack on the police station in the heart of the western town of Ramadi. Attackers fired small arms and rocket-propelled grenades from a black BMW in the assault in Ramadi, a city which US commanders have said they hope to bring under control by year-end amid an improvement in security there. In the capital, smoke was seen pouring out of a field artillery ammunition support vehicle after it hit a landmine at a major motorway intersection. In Mosul, police said US troops were hunting down former secret policeman Fawzi Qahtan, who was also the deposed Iraqi ruler's personal weapons trainer. **PHOTO CAPTION*** The body of a man killed in an explosion lies on the sidewalk in Baghdad, Friday, Dec. 5 2003. (AP Photo/Laurent Rebours)