IRAQ - Aug. 27 - Explosives Kill 2 US Soldiers; Oxfam Pulls Its Staff.

Two US soldiers are killed, one in Baghdad and the other in Falluja, a city to the west of the capital. In Falluja, a soldier from the Third Armoured Cavalry Regiment is killed and three are wounded by "an improvised explosive device", the US Central Command said in a news release. About 35 minutes later, in Baghdad, a soldier with the 205th Military Intelligence Brigade was killed and two others were wounded when their convoy was also attacked by an "improvised explosive device", the Central Command said. The US soldiers' deaths raise the toll to 142 since US Pres. Bush declared an end to major combat operations on May 1. A total of 280 have died since the start of the war on March 19. Meanwhile, Brendan Cox, a spokesman of the international relief agency Oxfam GB, said the agency had pulled its non-Iraqi personnel out of the country because of "a growing deterioration of the security situation". He said: "What we're doing is temporarily withdrawing international staff. We hope to go back in as soon as the security situation allows". Nine staff members were relocated to Amman, Jordan, leaving 53 Iraqi staff members to carry on Oxfam's work in Iraq. (Earlier this month, another relief group, Doctors Without Borders, relocated several of its workers to Kuwait from Basra after riots broke out there).