While people rallied en masse around the world in protest against the war launched one year ago, Iraqi people for the most part ignored the date and said they were more likely to gather next month on the anniversary of Saddam's fall.

"We would probably celebrate on April 9 because on that day, we got rid of Saddam and his evil regime, but we will not celebrate the launch of a war that has left us with nothing so far," said former government employee Adnan Saad.

"We are happy that Saddam is gone, but what have we got instead? I am unemployed and I stopped sending my five children to school mainly because of the catastrophic security situation," he said.

The anniversary comes after a week of heavy violence, including a suicide bombing and rocket strikes on hotels in the capital, and other attacks on US troops, police and civilians, including journalists.

In the latest incidents, an Iraqi police officer was shot dead early Saturday at a checkpoint near the northern oil centre of Kirkuk while a local Turkmen community leader there survived an assassination attempt.

The attacks came as US military and civilian officials multiplied their warnings that more spectacular attacks were likely as the June 30 deadline for a return of sovereignty to the Iraqi people neared.

"I expect in the run-up period to the transition of June 30 that we will have some really bad days," Iraq's US civilian administrator Paul Bremer told reporters Friday.

"The terrorists are going to continue and even accelerate their attacks particularly on Iraqi men, women and children as they did in Karbala ... and it happened the night before last here in Baghdad," he said.

More than 170 people died in coordinated strikes on Shiite Muslim shrines in the cities of Karbala and Baghdad on March 2, and seven people were killed in a suicide bombing outside a hotel in the capital on Wednesday.

Bremer said he feared more attacks on Iraq's Shiite majority and reiterated US charges they were being orchestrated by alleged al-Qaeda leader Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi in a bid to stoke civil war.

"We are concerned that Zarqawi and his people may try major attacks again when you have masses of Shia together again," he said.

Meanwhile, a third group of 130 Japanese soldiers entered Iraq Saturday to join the contingent based in the southern city of Samawa, the military said.