The British patrolled in tanks as hundreds of stone-throwing Iraqis rampaged in protest against fuel and power shortages. In one incident troops said they returned fire from gunmen, but a tense calm settled over Iraq (news - web sites)'s second city by evening.
The violence was some of the worst in Iraq since Saddam Hussein (news - web sites) was toppled by U.S.-led forces on April 9 and occurred in a city at the heart of the mostly Shi'ite Muslim south, which has been relatively peaceful in the wake of his fall. Iraq's majority Shi'ites were repressed under Saddam, a Sunni Muslim.
The British blame oil smugglers, looters and saboteurs for the fuel and power shortages, but Basra residents are angry at seeing fridges and air conditioners stop working as summer temperatures soar to more than 50 Celsius.
Southern Iraq's British-run administration said the security guard, a Nepalese Gurkha working for Global Security, was in a vehicle delivering mail for the United Nations (news - web sites) when he was killed by gunmen. Retired Gurkha soldiers from the British army are widely employed by security firms in Iraq.
Reporters in Basra said one Iraqi was killed by gunfire. It was not immediately clear who had fired the shots in a city, which like the rest of Iraq is awash with weapons. Two other Iraqis were wounded by gunfire.
Czech troops operating alongside the British said they also had to resort to warning shots and that another Iraqi was killed when he fell under the wheels of a truck he was trying to climb.
A Defence Ministry spokesman in Prague said the troops fired the shots after Iraqis threw stones at a convoy carrying water to a Czech field hospital. A military vehicle was damaged.
ARMOURED VEHICLES GUARD PETROL STATIONS
British troops in armoured vehicles guarded petrol stations where frustrated drivers queued for hours in the heat. Some Iraqis took an injured man to hospital in a school bus whose windows had been shattered by stones.
"(The British) did not give us what they promised, and we have had enough of waiting," said student Hassan Jasim, 19.
"It's not political. We don't have gas, power or salaries...all I want is water," said Fadil Salman, a driver.
Influential clerics, some of whom want an Iranian-style Shi'ite theocracy, have warned they are impatient for the running of the country to be returned to Iraqi hands.
In a repeat of some of Saturday's violence, cars from nearby Kuwait were targeted. Basra residents accuse Kuwaitis of involvement in smuggling cheap Iraqi oil out of the country.
Most of the violence since Saddam's fall has been concentrated in the former Iraqi president's Sunni heartlands in central Iraq where U.S. forces are stationed.
Two U.S. soldiers and a journalist were wounded in a grenade attack in Baghdad on Sunday, a U.S. military spokesman said. Al Jazeera television said one of its cameramen was hurt along with U.S. soldiers when a grenade was thrown at a U.S. patrol from an upper storey window at Baghdad University.
Further north, the U.S. spokesman said, two soldiers were wounded in a bomb attack. On a road near Tikrit, Saddam's home town some 170 km (110 miles) north of the capital, a Reuters correspondent saw a wrecked U.S. truck beside a crater which a soldier at the scene said was caused by a mine.
The U.S. military said a soldier died of apparent heat stress while travelling in a convoy. Troops clad in body armour and helmets have orders to drink large amounts of water to combat dehydration.
Fifty-five U.S. and six British troops have been killed by hostile fire since U.S. President George W. Bush (news - web sites) declared major combat over on May 1. Several foreign civilians have also died.
U.S. commanders mainly blame Saddam's die-hard loyalists for attacks on their troops, but say there is evidence of foreign terrorists coming to Iraq to target Americans.
The commanders believe they are closing in on Saddam himself and say they are stamping out the raids by killing and rounding up fighters.
Washington's top civilian administrator in Iraq, Paul Bremer, said hundreds of fighters from Ansar al-Islam -- an al Qaeda-linked group once based in the Kurdish-controlled north during Saddam's rule -- were planning major attacks.
Bremer, an anti-terrorism expert, told the New York Times last week's bombing of the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad in which 17 people were killed could have been the work of either Saddam loyalists or a mainly foreign group like Ansar.
(Additional reporting by Abdel Razzak Hamid in Basra, Andrew Marshall in Baghdad and Luke Baker in Tikrit)
