that toll includes eight civilian contractors working for the Pentagon . Nearly 30,000 others have been wounded in action . An attack involving a `` couple of rounds '' of fire on the International Zone , also known as the Green Zone , killed two soldiers and wounded 17 others about 3:30 p.m. , a military official said , declining to give the specific location of the attack for security reasons . A separate attack about 30 minutes earlier killed one soldier and wounded 14 at a U.S. military outpost in Rustamiya in southeastern Baghdad , the military said . Responding to al-Maliki 's comments , a spokesman for al-Sadr , Sheikh Salah al-Obeidi , said that any effort to bar Sadrists from participation in politics would be unconstitutional -- and that any decision to disband the Mehdi Army is not the government 's to make . `` It is up to the side that established it , '' he said . Al-Maliki spoke in an exclusive interview with CNN after a weeklong military offensive against what Iraqi officials called gangs and militia members in the southern Iraqi city of Basra . Hundreds were killed or wounded in the fighting
BAGHDAD , Iraq -LRB- CNN -RRB- -- Three U.S. soldiers were killed and 31 others wounded in two rocket attacks Sunday afternoon in Baghdad , the U.S. military said . Mehdi Army militiamen celebrate after attacking an Iraqi Army vehicle in Baghdad 's Sadr City on Sunday . Earlier Sunday , fighting between U.S. troops and the Mehdi Army militia loyal to Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr left at least 20 dead and 52 wounded in Baghdad 's Sadr City , according to an Iraqi Interior Ministry official . The U.S. military said it had no information about the Sadr City fighting . Sunday 's violence came as Iraqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki demanded al-Sadr disband his Mehdi Army and threatened to bar al-Sadr 's followers from the political process if the cleric refused . Watch a report from the front line in Sadr City '' `` A decision was taken yesterday that they no longer have a right to participate in the political process or take part in the upcoming elections unless they end the Mehdi Army , '' al-Maliki said . Sunday 's American fatalities bring the death toll of U.S. troops in the Iraq war to 4,022 ;