Baghdad: Twenty people were killed 65 wounded in a suicide car bombing that ripped the front gate of the US headquarters in Baghdad, according to the US military and Iraqi hospitals.

A US military spokesman said there were 18 killed and 28 wounded from a toll compiled at its own military hospitals, including two Americans working for the US Defence Department and 16 Iraqis.

The spokesman said the US military was not counting those brought into local Iraqi hospitals.

Another two people were reported dead at Baghdad's Yarmuk hospital, an emergency room doctor said.

There were no other reported fatalities at Baghdad's local hospitals, where the number of wounded was put at 37 from Yarmuk, al-Kindi and the Neurological Surgical hospital.

The US military spokesman identified the wounded in US hospitals as 22 Iraqi civilians, four US civilian contractors and two US soldiers.