Baghdad  - The US military in Iraq announced Sunday the deaths of five soldiers in two attacks, while in the southern city of Basra the Iraqi army blew up the headquarters of the Shiite Thaarallah party in a mosque.

The US military said four Marines had been killed Friday by a roadside bomb in the western Anbar province, and another soldier died that evening when a roadside bomb struck a patrol in eastern Baghdad.

Meanwhile, Iraqi and US troops continued their onslaught on militiamen from Mahdi Army of radical Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr in eastern Baghdad's Sadr City slum area.

The US military said it struck with precision-controlled munitions "a criminal element command-and-control centre" in Sadr City Saturday.

The military uses the term "criminal elements" to refer to Iranian-backed Shiite gunmen.

The missiles reportedly fell near a hospital, wounding civilians, according to witnesses.

In Basra, the Iraqi army blew up a Shiite mosque housing the main headquarters of Thaarallah party, witnesses told Deutsche Presse- Agentur dpa.

The Iraqi army ordered local residents living close to the mosque in Nuab al-Dubat to keep away while it blew up the mosque, the witnesses said.

Security officials told the Voices of Iraq news agency that the destruction of the mosque came after troops found weapons and explosives there.

The leader of the party, Yusif Sinawi, had been arrested in April following clashes between security forces and his guards. He has allegedly been involved in paramilitary activities, killings and abductions in Basra.

Thaarallah was established in 2005 as a local party operating mainly in Basra, 550 kilometres south of Iraq. (dpa)