BAGHDAD, November 20 (IslamOnline.net & News Agencies) - U.S. occupation forces killed 10 Iraqi “attackers” in north-central Iraq on Thursday, November 20, as at least 16 others, including children, were slain in a series of explosions separately rocking the war-ravaged country.

U.S. forces using helicopters and tanks killed 10 people in the north-central Iraqi city of Samarra, a spokesman for the 4th Infantry Division was quoted by Agence France-Presse (AFP) as saying Thursday.

Lieutenant-Colonel Bill MacDonald said that those killed tried to attack a U.S. envoy with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades to ambush the convoy on Wednesday, November 19, afternoon.

He said U.S. troops used machine-guns, helicopters and tank canons in the attack, killing 10 people and destroying three cars.

The United States blame the attack against its forces on remnants of the Saddam regime, but resentment over continued occupation of the oil-rich country is running high among local inhabitants, also jeered by the U.S. military provocations including detentions and random shootings.

About 300 lawyers demonstrated Thursday in the northern city of Mosul against the detention by U.S. forces of two colleagues, one day after U.S. occupation forces launched all-out air and ground raids and detained more than 161 people in northern Iraq.

In the meantime, four Iraqis were killed and 18 wounded in the northern oil centre of Kirkuk on Thursday, when a bomber blew up a car packed with explosives at a checkpoint near Kurdish offices, police and officials said.

The target of the attack was the offices of the two main Kurdish factions - the Patriotic Union of Kurdistan and the Kurdistan Democratic Party - but the vehicle was stopped 200 meters (yards) away, said Sherku Shaker, chief of police.

The dead apart from the bomber were a schoolmistress and two pupils caught up in the blast in the busy city centre district, he said.

Five of the wounded were from the PUK, local commander Jalal Jowher said.

He accused members of either Kurdish-based group Ansar Al-Islam or Al-Qaeda of being behind “this cowardly act”.

Noticeably, many Iraqis accuse the two Kurdish factions of collaboration with occupation forces, suggestion used by observers to explain similar attacks against the U.S.-employed Iraqi chiefs.

Iraqi Education Minister Ala'a Abdul Sahib Al-Alwan said on Wednesday that a top official with the Iraqi Education Ministry has been assassinated in Diwaniyah province by unknown assailants.

In the western Baghdad town of Ramadi, 8 Iraqis were killed and 12 wounded in a car bomb explosion overnight outside the home of a leading tribal sheikh, medical sources said Thursday.

Two platoons rushed to the scene, and said the outer wall of the guest house had collapsed, causing many of the casualties, according to CNN.

Iraqi police said eight Iraqis were killed in the blast -- including some of the sheikh's relatives.

Two bystanders were killed and seven people in adjoining homes were injured, a U.S. military official said.

The attack was one of a spate of five rocking the city on Wednesday, just a day after local U.S. commander Major General Charles Swannack hailed a major improvement in security in the town that might permit a U.S. troop pullback by year-end.

It came a few days after the U.S. 82nd Airborne Division launched a series of raids against resistance fighters, leaving 26 local inhabitants detained.

“One of the wounded suffered serious injuries. The children were 11 or 12,” the director of Karbala's Al-Hussein Hospital, Abbas Mussa al-Tamimi told AFP.

Police said they had opened an inquiry into Wednesday's blast at the Al-Abed school, two kilometers (just over a mile) west of the city.

It was not immediately clear whether the explosion was the result of a deliberate attack or one of the children had brought unexploded ordnance into the school as a toy.

Many unexploded missiles were left in Iraq by the U.S. forces after weeks of a large-scale attack beginning on March 20.

Jordanian Embassy Attacked

Also Thursday, an Iraqi policeman was killed as unknown assailants fired on the Jordanian embassy in Baghdad, Jordan's foreign ministry spokesman said.

"Unknown assailants in a passing car fired shots at the Jordanian embassy and killed an Iraqi policeman on guard," Ali Al-Ayed said, adding that no diplomats were hurt.

“The Jordanian embassy is in contact with the concerned parties in Iraq to shed light on the affair,” he said.

Fourteen people were killed and more than 40 wounded in a devastating car-bomb attack on Jordan's embassy in the Iraqi capital on August 7.

The foreign ministry spokesman stressed that “all these desperate attempts will not affect the commitment of Jordan to fulfill its duty towards the Iraqi people”.