BAGHDAD (AP) -- A suicide car bomber blasted a police checkpoint outside the courthouse in Ramadi on Wednesday, killing up to six people and wounding as many as 22 in the first such attack in months in the former Sunni insurgent stronghold.

Also Wednesday, the U.S. military reported that an American soldier and an Iraqi interpreter were killed in a bombing in east Baghdad -- another sign of the lingering dangers in Iraq despite the recent downturn in violence

Suicide bombings, ambushes and killings used to be a daily feature of life in Ramadi, capital of Anbar province, until Sunni tribesmen turned against al-Qaida in Iraq and helped American forces drive the extremists from the city.