Iraq on the frontline of terror battle: US

The multi-ethnic city of Kirkuk was tested by the killing of three Turkmen in demonstrations, as British troops in the southern port of Basra went back out on patrol the day after three of their soldiers were killed in a drive-by shooting.

The continued violence around the country came as US civil administrator Paul Bremer declared Iraq one of the main battlefields in the US-declared war on terror, in the aftermath of Tuesday's suicide attack on the UN building in Baghdad that killed 23 people and wounded more than 100.

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"It is now unfortunately the case that Iraq has become one of the fields of battle in this global war" on terror, Bremer told reporters.

His comments echoed the tough words of his boss, President George W. Bush, who in his weekly radio address warned terrorists would be hunted down by America wherever they are.

In a worrying sign for Bush, a Newsweek poll, released this weekend, found that more registered voters -- 49 percent -- would not want Bush to return for a second term in office if the elections were now, compared with 44 percent who would.

The poll found 69 percent of Americans are now convinced the United States will become bogged down in Iraq, while 66 percent said the US government was spending too much on rebuilding Iraq.

The pressure also grew Sunday on Bush's chief ally, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, as questions piled up over his actions before the apparent suicide of an arms expert at the centre of allegations that his government embellished the case for war in Iraq.

Just five days before Blair was due to testify, the independent judicial inquiry into arms expert David Kelly's death published Saturday thousands of pages of private e-mails and memoranda from, among others, the prime minister's closest aides.

In Brazil, UN chief Kofi Annan paid an emotional farewell to his slain Iraq representative Sergio Vieira de Mello in the diplomat's hometown of Rio De Janeiro Saturday.

Meanwhile, Iraq's US-approved 25-member Governing Council sent a delegation to Egypt for meetings in a bid to win legitimacy around the Arab world.

The Iraqi delegation was led by Ibrahim Jafari, the council's current head, who announced his team would hold meetings with Egyptian Foreign Secretary Ahmed Maher and Arab League Secretary General Amr Mussa.

Until now, Arab states have given the Governing Council the cold shoulder, refusing to recognise it as representative of the Iraqi people.