US forces shot dead several Iraqis, possibly as many as seven on Tuesday, returning fire on demonstrators in the northern town of Mosul, a US general said on Wednesday.
"Fire was indeed delivered from coalition forces, it was lethal fire and some Iraqis were killed as a result, we think the number is in the order of seven and we think there were some wounded as well," said Brigadier General Vincent Brooks at US Central Command's war base.
Hospital sources in Mosul said the death toll in Tuesday's shootings had risen to 15 with 28 wounded.
At Centcom on Tuesday Navy Commander Charles Owens had insisted that US forces "did not shoot into a crowd," echoing a US spokesman in Mosul.
Meanwhile, a rally of around 20,000 mostly Shiite Muslims, unthinkable a week ago under Saddam Hussein's Sunni regime, protested at the meeting held near Nasiriyah in southern Iraq, underscoring the scope of the changes sweeping Iraq and the challenges facing Washington's effort to re-make the country.
US officials expressed hope the main stage of hostilities was over with the fall of Saddam's hometown of Tikrit on Monday, but were not yet ready to declare victory.
"Our victory in Iraq is certain, but not yet complete," said US President George W Bush on day 27 of the war launched by US and British forces.
Washington also kept up pressure on Syria, which it accuses of supporting terrorism and having harbored Saddam supporters, shutting off an oil pipeline which it says was transporting oil in violation of UN sanctions.
{{/usCountry}}Washington also kept up pressure on Syria, which it accuses of supporting terrorism and having harbored Saddam supporters, shutting off an oil pipeline which it says was transporting oil in violation of UN sanctions.
{{/usCountry}}The meeting of some 80 delegates, who included local and exiled opposition leaders as well as religious officials, adopted a statement declaring that a future Iraqi government must be democratic and based on the rule of law, and that no leader should be imposed from outside.
But Iraq's leading Shiite group boycotted the meeting and a key opposition leader sent only a representative amid distrust over the role of the United States and internal division over how to craft a representative government.
The special White House envoy to the Iraqi opposition, Zalmay Khalilzad, told the meeting in the biblical city of Ur that the United States had "no intention of ruling Iraq" after the fall of Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein.
"We want you to establish your own democratic system based on Iraqi traditions and values," he said.
The delegates also agreed Saddam's Baath party must be dissolved and called for a democratic federal system, but said a future government should be chosen on the basis of countrywide consultation and not based on communal identity.
They agreed to meet again in 10 days "to discuss procedures for developing an Iraqi interim authority."
Many Iraqis fear US plans for the future of Iraq and popular anger has been mounting over the widespread anarchy and chaos since Saddam was toppled last Wednesday.
That anger was visible in Nasiriyah as a crowd of 20,000 marched through the street chanting "Yes to freedom... Yes to Islam... No to America, No to Saddam."
Such anger was also visible in the northern city of Mosul, when a firefight broke out as the newly-appointed governor was making a speech which listeners deemed was too pro-US, witnesses said.
A doctor at the city hospital, Ayad al-Ramadhani, said 12 people had been killed and 60 wounded in the shooting.
US troops guarding the governor said they opened fire after gunmen on an opposite roof began shooting.
"We didn't fire at the crowd, but at the top of the building," said a US military spokesman.
At US Central Command in Qatar, Navy Commander Charles Owens said: "We're investigating, all we can say now is that we did not shoot into a crowd."
But witnesses said US troops fired into the crowd after it became increasingly hostile towards the new governor, Mashaan al-Juburi.
"They (the soldiers) climbed on top of the building and first fired at a building near the crowd, with the glass falling on the civilians. People started to throw stones, then the Americans fired at them," said Ayad Hassun.
"Dozens of people fell," he said, his own shirt stained with blood.
In another step bringing more of Iraq under US control, the commander of a 16,000-strong Iraqi military unit surrendered an area in western Iraq extending to the Syrian border.
A scaledown of the 300,000-strong US force deployed in the region was also underway.
Two US aircraft carriers -- the USS Kitty Hawk and the USS Constellation -- were due to head home from the Gulf as early as this week.
Syria remained in the sights of US officials, who accuse the regime of President Bashar al-Assad of state terrorism, developing weapons of mass destruction and of harbouring fugitive Iraqi officials.
US Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said coalition forces have shut down an oil pipeline between Iraq and Syria that was allegedly used to supply oil in volume to Syria in violation of UN sanctions.
The Syrian government hit back, condemning "the threatening language and the baseless accusations levelled by certain American officials against Syria with the aim of striking a blow at its firm position, influence its decisions and it commitment to international legitimacy."
US forces tried for the first time to prevent the media from covering anti-US protests outside the hotel housing a US operations base in central Baghdad.