An attempt has been made on the life of Iraq's Deputy Prime Minister Ahmad Chalabi.

Unknown gunmen opened fire on the convoy injuring three as it was returning from the city of Karbala, Intifadh Qanbar, an official with Chalabi's Iraqi National Congress Party, said. Police said one bodyguard was killed.

Chalabi himself however was not aboard the vehicle.

Three of the attackers were killed and another wounded and captured, a Defence Ministry source said.

The ambush occurred in a town south of Baghdad, Latifiya. Two cars were destroyed during the attack.

Two of Chalabi's bodyguards were killed in an attack on his convoy in the same area last September.

Former Pentagon favorite Chalabi, achieved a remarkable political recovery when he was made one of premier Ibrahim al-Jaafari's deputies in his government announced in May.

Chalabi, a former ally of the United States also lobbied strongly in Washington for the invasion of Iraq and plays a key role in setting oil policy in the country.

Car bomb

Earlier on Sunday a car bomb has exploded near an Iraqi police checkpoint south of Baghdad, killing seven people, police said, while the US military announced that five soldiers had been killed in two bomb attacks a day earlier.

The area south of Baghdad, in and around Hilla, has been dubbed "the triangle of death" by US forces because of the frequency of attacks.

Iraqi forces have set up checkpoints in the area to stem attacks.

School clash

US marines used tanks and aircraft to battle fighters in western Iraq on Sunday after the Americans came under attack from a village schoolhouse, the US military said. Eleven fighters were killed, the military said.

US Abrams tanks and jet aircraft attacked the school, setting off secondary explosions from the munitions stored inside, the statement added.

US soldiers killed

On Saturday, five US soldiers were killed and two wounded in two bomb attacks on their patrols in the Iraqi capital, the US military said on Sunday.

One soldier was killed and two wounded when their military vehicle was blown up in the capital's southern district of Dora.

Another four soldiers were killed in a second bomb attack in southwest Baghdad, Sergeant David Abrams said.

PHOTO CAPTION

A bodyguard for Iraq's deputy prime minister, his face hidden to conceal his identity, is treated in a Baghdad hospital following an attack in Latifiya, a town south of Baghdad July 31, 2005. (REUTERS)