BAGHDAD, 25 March 2004 — Guerrillas attacked a US military patrol west of Baghdad early yesterday and an ensuing fight left three civilians dead and two US soldiers injured, the US military and Iraqi hospital officials said.

The fighting came a day after assailants shot at a van carrying police recruits south of Baghdad, killing nine, while gunmen killed two policemen in the north. Yesterday, the police chief of a nearby district was shot and killed. The slayings are the latest to target police and other Iraqis who work with the US-led occupation.

In a speech in central Baghdad, meanwhile, top US administrator Paul Bremer said Iraq is “on the path to full democracy” and has made significant economic progress since Saddam Hussein was toppled nearly a year ago.

Associated Press Television News footage of the aftermath of the fighting in the town of Fallujah, 55 kilometers (32 miles) west of Baghdad, showed two civilian cars burned, bloodstains on the ground and bullet holes in walls, as well as two wounded Iraqis being taken into a hospital.

“American troops came under attack while they were patrolling in the main street,” Fallujah resident Ahmed Ali said.

The US military said two “coalition personnel” were injured. The pair were flown from Fallujah to a combat hospital after attackers detonated a roadside bomb and raked their vehicle with gunfire, a US official said.

Muthana Al-Jumeili, a doctor at Fallujah General Hospital, said three civilians died and three others were wounded. Fallujah is a hotbed of rebel activity.

On the eastern outskirts of Baghdad, three civilians — a 3-year-old boy, his grandmother and a male relative — were killed when an explosion destroyed the car they were riding in, according to relatives. Six other people were injured in the blast, which relatives said was caused by a mine in the road.

Also before dawn yesterday, attackers fired a rocket that struck the Sheraton Hotel in Baghdad, where foreign contractors and journalists stay. The rocket hit a sixth-floor ledge and the explosion left the lobby strewn with glass. US officials said there were no casualties. American soldiers protect the Sheraton, which is ringed by a concrete blast wall to ward off bombing attempts.

Another rocket was fired into the headquarters of the coalition in Baghdad early yesterday, wounding a contractor, a senior US official said without elaborating.

In the southern province of Babil yesterday, the police chief of Jalf Al-Sakhr district, Maj. Yassin Ghdayeb, was shot and killed while on his way to work, local police officials said on condition of anonymity.

The killing came a day after a nearby roadside attack on police recruits that took place between Musayeb and Hillah when a car pulled in front of the minibus and assailants sprayed it with small arms fire, police in Hillah said.

A US military official confirmed that nine people died and two were wounded. Iraqi police said one wounded trainee survived.

In the northern city of Kirkuk, gunmen in a car killed two policemen and wounded two others, police Capt. Abdul-Salam Zangana said.

North of Baghdad on Tuesday, a US military vehicle in a convoy fatally struck an Iraqi girl near Balad, and four American soldiers and two Iraqi civilians were injured in a separate accident involving two military vehicles near Tikrit, the US military said. The soldiers were in stable condition, and the condition of the Iraqis was unknown.

Iraq’s main oil pipeline leading to the Gulf ruptured late Tuesday, spilling large amounts of oil that later caught fire, officials said.