BAGHDAD, Iraq - The U.S. military said today that four U.S. soldiers were killed in two separate roadside bombings near the insurgent stronghold of Ramadi, pushing the toll of American forces killed in Iraq past 1,900.

The soldiers died in two separate bomb attacks Monday during combat operations in the volatile western Iraqi city, the military said. The victims were U.S. Army soldiers attached to the 2nd Marine Division, II Marine Expeditionary Force.

As of today, 1,903 members of the U.S. military have died since the beginning of the Iraq war in March 2003, according to an Associated Press count. At least 1,483 died as a result of hostile action, according to the military's numbers. The figures include five military civilians.

Ramadi, a city of about 350,000, has been the scene of intense but sporadic fighting since the insurgency gained strength and began its offensive against U.S. forces during the summer of 2003.

The Euphrates River city is the capital of Anbar Province, a huge region that stretches east from Baghdad to the Saudi, Jordanian and Syrian borders. Many cities, towns and villages along the river are insurgent strongholds, where Saddam Hussein loyalists have teamed with infiltrating foreign fighters of al-Qaida in Iraq to battle the Americans and U.S.-trained Iraqi army and police.

U.S. forces took control of the nearby city of Fallujah after days of intense and bloody fighting in November.

There have been reports of fighting in the region since Thursday, when al-Qaida in Iraq said in an Internet posting that its forces and the Americans had engaged in heavy combat.

Also today, a U.S. official said that a suicide bomber killed four Americans - a diplomatic security agent and three private security agents - in the northern city of Mosul. No other details were provided by the official, who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to release the information.

The Sunni-dominated insurgency has conducted a rampage of violent attacks since an insurgent suicide bomber blew himself up in the middle of laborers gathered for day work in Baghdad, killing 112 people, mostly Shiites. Thirteen more suicide and roadside bombings in the next 10 hours produced a staggering toll of 167 dead, the bloodiest day in the capital since the U.S.-led invasion.

Al-Qaida in Iraq claimed responsibility, and its leader, Jordanian-born terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, declared war on the country's Shiite majority.

On Sunday, an Iraqi journalist working for The New York Times was killed after men claiming to be police officers took him from his home, the newspaper said. Fakher Haider, 38, was found dead in a deserted area on the city's outskirts Monday, hands bound with at least one gunshot to the head, the Times reported.

Last month, freelance journalist Steven Vincent was killed after he wrote a column in the Times accusing Basra police of being infiltrated by Shiite militiamen. He was abducted and his body was discovered that night by a highway south of Basra. A senior British official said Islamic militants - and not Iraqi police - probably killed Vincent.