U.S. deaths in Iraq at seven-month high in April

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - The death toll for U.S. troops in Iraq reached a seven month high in April, with the reported deaths of three more soldiers on Wednesday bringing the monthly toll to 47, the highest since last September.

U.S. and Iraqi forces have been engaged in intense fighting over the past month with Shi'ite militia fighters in Baghdad's tightly-packed Sadr City slum.

Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki, who launched a crackdown against the Mehdi Army militia a month ago in the southern city of Basra, said on Wednesday the government would disarm the fighters by force if they refuse to lay down their weapons.

Two hospitals in Sadr City, the Shi'ite slum that has been the focus of fighting in the capital, said they had received the bodies of 421 Iraqis killed and treated more than 2,400 wounded there since late March. Government spokesman Tahseen al-Sheikhly said the toll there was higher, with more than 900 killed.

Many of the dead and wounded have been civilians, caught in the crossfire in the crowded slum.

Some of the heaviest fighting has taken place in the past three days, with militiamen taking advantage of blinding dust storms that ground U.S. attack helicopters to launch large ambushes of U.S. and Iraqi positions.

U.S. forces have responded with tank fire and surface-to-surface missiles, destroying buildings.

Thirty-four bodies and 112 wounded victims were brought to the two Sadr City hospitals in the last 24 hours, hospital officials said. American forces said they killed 34 militiamen in Sadr City on Tuesday in a series of clashes including one street battle that raged for four hours.

April's U.S. death toll is the highest since September 2007, when 65 U.S. soldiers died in Iraq, according to official figures tracked by icasualties.org, an independent website.