KIEV (AFP) ??” A Ukrainian soldier was killed and five others anguished in fighting with supporters of radical Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr in the city of Kut southerly of the capital Baghdad.

KIEV (AFP) ??” A Ukrainian soldier was killed and five others anguished in fighting with supporters of radical Shiite Muslim cleric Moqtada Sadr in the city of Kut southerly of the capital Baghdad.

The soldier, the first Ukrainian serviceman to be killed in combat in Iraq, died from his injuries after being hit by means of a grenade during fighting for direct of a bridge, the guarding ministry said in a statement Tuesday.

The lives of the other five soldiers are not in danger, it added.

Sadr's militia seized direct of Kut, 180 kilometres (110 miles) southerly of Baghdad, over the weekend from Ukrainian companys an Iraqi civil defense officer who