FALLUJAH, Iraq (AFP) - US warplanes pounded the Sunni insurgent enclave of Fallujah, killing seven Iraqis in a raid on a suspected hideout of a militant group holding a British hostage, while another seven Iraqis died in a rebel attack near the capital.
The insurgent gunmen targeted a minibus carrying national guard recruits in the latest deadly attack against Iraq's fledgling security forces, which White House guest Prime Minister Iyad Allawi promised would secure his war-torn country in time for January elections to be held.
The US military revealed three marines had been killed in Al-Anbar province, which includes Fallujah, on Friday, as Iraq took centre-stage in an increasingly acrimonious presidential election campaign back home.
As the whereabouts of kidnapped British engineer Kenneth Bigley remained unknown, a delegation from the Muslim Council of Britain was dispatched to press for the 62-year-old's release by his Islamist captors.
"We are undertaking this mission with the hope that there is still a possibility that Mr Bigley is alive, and that there may be some hope that the hostage-takers are holding out for something," said delegation member Daoud Abdullah.
It was not clear when the delegation would arrive, or who they would meet.
Bigley was seized from his Baghdad home earlier this month together with two US colleagues who have already been beheaded by the Unity and Holy War group of alleged al-Qaeda operative Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi.
The engineer's family continued to issue desperate pleas for his life, this time asking Dutch Foreign Minister Bernard Bot -- whose country holds the rotating presidency of the European Union -- to make an appeal on the Arab news network Al-Jazeera.
Bot declined, arguing such a move would do nothing to soften the captors.
US forces continued their almost daily strikes against the Zarqawi's supsected refuge in Fallujah, west of Baghdad, killing seven Iraqis, including women and children, medics said.
The US military said the airforce "conducted a strike inflicting a blow to the Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi terrorist network by conducting a precision strike on a known terrorist meeting site in central Fallujah."
It said other overnight operations in the insurgent-held town were aimed at destroying an "offensive obstacle belt... consisting of a series of concrete jersey barriers, earthen barriers and roadblocks, interlaced with improvised explosive devices."
Three US marines were killed on Friday while patrolling Al-Anbar province, which includes Fallujah but also the restive city of Ramadi and the troubled Syrian border district, the military revealed without elaborating.
A drive-by shooting near Baghdad on a minibus carrying national guard recruits left seven dead and one wounded early Saturday, medics said.
The ambush took place on a major thoroughfare where another attack on national guard recruits left seven dead on Wednesday.
At least one rocket and three mortar rounds also struck Iraq's heavily fortified oil ministry building, causing some damage but no casualties, a spokesman said.
On a trip to the United States, the Iraqi premier assured the US administration that his forces could secure the country but demanded broader participation from the international community.
"I appeal to all representatives from the countries gathered here to help Iraq defeat the forces of terrorism and help Iraq build a better future for the people of Iraq," Allawi told the UN General Assembly.
The hawkish premier came under fire for painting an unrealistically rosy picture of his country's situation, where ever-worsening violence is impeding progress by the fledgling security apparatus, reconstruction efforts and legal proceedings against the former regime.
A former CIA-backed coup plotter, Allawi insisted that elections would go ahead as planned, but even US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld acknowledged that the vote might have to exclude no-go zones like Fallujah.
Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, who has been stepping up his attacks against the US administration's handling of the war in Iraq, turned against Allawi Friday and charged the Iraqi premier was turning a blind eye to the reality on the ground.
His comments prompted US President George W. Bush to chastise his rival in the November 2 election.
"You can't lead this country if your ally in Iraq feels like you question his credibility," Bush said a day after welcoming Allawi to the White House to help spread his optimistic view of the war-torn nation's future.