March 20:

-- The United States launches war on Iraq with limited air strikes on Baghdad, after Iraqi President Saddam Hussein rejects a US deadline to leave the country

March 21:

-- The United States fires 1,000 cruise missiles on hundreds of targets in Baghdad and elsewhere

March 23:

-- US air raids pound Baghdad, the northern city of Mosul and positions held by Kurdish Islamist group allegedly linked to al-Qaeda

March 24:

-- Iraq's northern oil capital of Kirkuk is rocked by 24 hours of bombardment

March 25:

-- British and US forces take control of Umm Qasr

March 27:

-- 1,000 US paratroopers parachute into the Kurdish-held north

March 28:

-- At least 30 people are killed in an air strike on a busy Baghdad market, Iraq says

March 31:

-- US forces report their first serious battle with the Republican Guard, south of Baghdad

April 1:

-- US forces shoot dead seven women and children at a military checkpoint

April 3:

-- US troops reach Baghdad airport, 20 kilometres (13 miles) from the city centre

April 4:

-- Kurdish fighters cross a bridge near the strategic northern junction of Khazer after more than 24 hours of fierce fighting

-- Expatriate UN aid workers return to Iraq

April 6:

-- 18 Kurds are killed and 45 wounded near Arbil in northern Iraq when US aircraft mistakenly bomb a Kurdish-US convoy

April 7:

-- US forces move into Baghdad and seize several presidential palaces

April 8:

-- Bush pledges after a two-day Belfast summit with Blair that the UN will play a vital role in post-war Iraq

April 9:

-- US Marines help Iraqis pull down a huge statue of Saddam in central Baghdad, as scenes of jubilation spread throughout the capital

April 10

-- US-backed Kurdish forces seize the heart of the northern oil city of Kirkuk without a fight

-- Iraqis begin widespread looting of ministries, shops and museums across Baghdad

April 11

-- The United States issues a list of its 55 most-wanted Iraqis

April 12

-- Saddam's chief weapons advisor, Lieutenant General Amer al-Saadi, turns himself in to US forces and insists the ousted regime did not have weapons of mass destruction

April 13

-- US troops enter Saddam's ancestral home town of Tikrit

-- Iraqi presidential advisor and former interior minister Watban Ibrahim Hasan is arrested

-- Bush accuses Syria of having chemical weapons and warns it must cooperate with US forces to eradicate last remnants of Saddam's regime

-- Seven US prisoners of war, the last remaining POWs in Iraqi hands, are found in good shape by US troops

April 14

-- US forces take control of Tikrit, effectively ending the military campaign

-- US Central Command says all Iraqi oil wells are under control of US and British forces

-- Iraqi police escorted by US soldiers begin first joint patrols in Baghdad

April 15

-- Fifteen people are killed in Mosul by US troops, witnesses say. US forces later admit to shooting dead seven people

-- The United States threatens Syria with diplomatic and economic sanctions amid reports Damascus has given refuge to fleeing Iraqi officials

April 17

-- Coalition forces arrest Barzan al-Tikriti, half-brother of Saddam Hussein

-- Two Iraqis with close ties to the opposition Iraqi National Congress, Mohammed Mohsen Zubeidi and Jaudat Obeidi, declare themselves governor and mayor of Baghdad respectively. US forces say their appointments were not approved by Washington

April 18

-- The US military announces the capture of top Baath Party official Samir al-Aziz al-Najim

-- Thousands of Iraqis stage anti-US protests

April 19

-- Washington says former Iraqi finance minister Hikmat al-Azzawi, who figures 45th on a US list of 55 most-wanted Iraqis, has been arrested by Iraqi police

April 20

-- A 50-truck convoy carrying the first substantial food aid to Iraq arrives in Baghdad from Jordan

-- The opposition Iraqi National Congress says Jamal Mustafa Abdullah, deputy head of the tribal affairs office and a son-in-law of Saddam, has surrendered.

April 21

-- Retired US general Jay Garner, the US administrator, arrives in Baghdad and vows to restore water and power as soon as possible

-- Hundreds of thousands of Shiite Muslims gather in the holy city of Karbala for a pilgrimage banned under Saddam

-- The graves of nearly 1,000 political prisoners are discovered near Baghdad

-- The US military says it has arrested Mohammed Hamza al-Zubaidi, a key member of Saddam's inner circle and number 18 on Washington's most-wanted list

April 22

-- US forces confirm they are holding Jamal Mustafa Abdullah Sultan, one of Saddam's sons-in-law

-- US Central Command confirms US forces have reached a ceasefire agreement with the Iraq-based Iranian armed opposition group, the People's Mujahedeen.

-- France calls at the UN Security Council for suspension of crippling economic sanctions on Iraq since 1990, but says their removal -- which the US wants -- requires the UN to certify Iraq free of banned weapons

April 23

-- US Secretary of State Colin Powell says France will face consequences for its opposition to the war in Iraq

-- The White House says that economic sanctions on Iraq must be lifted, "not merely suspended," an apparent rebuff of Paris' proposal to the Security Council

-- Iraq's US civil administrator, retired general Jay Garner, says that a post-Saddam elected government would be headed by one leader who could represent the country's diverse ethnic make-up

-- The Iraq-based People's Mujahedeen guerilla group says a ceasefire agreement reached with US forces lets them keep their arms while maintaining their war against the Iranian government

April 24

-- Iraqi government ministries will begin reopening next week and oil is again flowing from wells but only for Iraqi uses, the United States announces.

-- The United States announces the capture of four more key members of Saddam Hussein's inner circle, while Iran warns patrolling US troops not to violate its border with Iraq.

-- The UN Security Council extends emergency arrangements for running the UN's oil-for-food programme in Iraq until June 3.

-- A United Nations watchdog warns that war damage to sanitation and electricity systems, coupled with worsening pollution, had aggravated Iraq's environmental crisis and posed a threat to health.

-- British Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon stresses that verification of any discovery of weapons of mass destruction in Iraq need not automatically be done by the United Nations.

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