theimage PHOTO CAPTION A young girl rests in a Fallujah, Iraq, hospital after an attack by U.S. troops on two cars at a checkpoint in Fallujah, in this image made from television Saturday, Sept 27, 2003. At least four Iraqis were killed and three others injured according to local residents and Arab satellite television. The condition of the girl was not available. (AP Photo/APTN)

Iraqis in the town of Fallujah said Saturday that U.S. troops killed four civllians when they opened fire on two cars at a checkpoint. The witnesses say several people were wounded in the shooting incident late Friday.

Fallujah, less than 60 kilometers west of Baghdad, has been a flash point of tension between Iraqi civilia! ns and U.S. forces carrying out security patrols.

The U.S. military confirmed that troops fired on vehicles in eastern Fallujah late Friday. An American spokesman says two people died and four were wounded, but no other details were immediately available.

Fallujah is in the so-called Sunni Triangle, an area west and northwest of the Iraqi capital where opposition to U.S. occupation forces in strong and violent. U.S. troops shot dead eight Iraqi policemen and a Jordanian hospital security guard in an incident near Fallujah earlier this month.

Despite the continuing violence in Iraq, U.S. Secretary of State Colin Powell said Friday at the United Nations that Washington expects Iraq's emerging political leadership to write and adopt a new constitution within six months, and to hold free elections another six months after that. Mr. Powell vowed that the United States will make certain Iraq is secure before power is turned over to an elected civilian gover! nment. France and other countries have been pressing for a quicker transfer to power in Iraq, but President Bush says elections must take place first. The United States is trying to gain U.N. Security Council approval for a new resolution on Iraq with broad international support for reconstruction of the war-torn country.

In another development, the top U.S. administrator for Iraq, Paul Bremer, has disclosed that American forces in Iraq have taken into custody 19 suspected members of the al-Qaida terrorist network.

Speaking to reporters at the Pentagon Friday, Mr. Bremer said he does not know the suspects' nationalities, but that they are among 248 foreign fighters held by coalition forces in Iraq. Most of those fighters are Syrians, Iranians or Yemenis.

Mr. Bremer says an influx of terrorist fighters into Iraq has become a major problem for U.S.-led forces.