"We have some indicators that they may be planning on executing kind of a large media type event," said Major General John Kelly, commander of the I Marine Expeditionary Force in western Iraq.

His comments came amid news of a suicide attack by a man wearing an explosive belt that killed five US soldiers and wounded three others Monday in the center of Baghdad.

Just days earlier, 68 people were killed in suicide attacks in the Baghdad's central commercial district of Karada.

Pentagon press secretary Geoff Morrell suggested Al-Qaeda was responding to pressure from a US-led military campaign that has squeezed it into the northern part of the country.

"We are starting to see some elements of Al-Qaeda lash out in other areas, perhaps in an attempt to distract us from the fight that is underway in the north," he told reporters.

Morrell said the US military was prepared to handle both.

Suicide attacks and huge car bombings with large numbers of civilian casualties have long been a signature of Al-Qaeda in Iraq, which has used the tactic to destabilize the country and inflame sectarian divisions.

The bombing of a golden domed Shiite shrine in Samarra in February 2006 tipped the country into open sectarian conflict.

Kelly said it was unclear from the intelligence where Al-Qaeda might try to stage the attacks.

But he said he was focused on the threat in Al-Anbar province, a former Al-Qaeda stronghold until they were evicted last year by an alliance of tribal sheikhs and US forces.

Kelly said it will be more difficult than before for Al-Qaeda to build and move massive bombs around the province.

"The good news is we don't believe they are at liberty to build some of these large bomb-type devices inside the province," Kelly said. "They have to kind of import them in."

"And the longer they travel, with all of the Iraqi army and Iraqi police checkpoints, which are virtually everywhere, the likelihood they will be discovered is pretty high," he said.

Levels of violence have dropped sharply in western Iraq, but Kelly said Al-Qaeda "is down but not out."

Kelly said he recently spoke to two Al-Qaeda fighters who were captured wearing suicide vests. They had returned to the province after being driven from the northern city of Mosul, he said.

"Certainly if they are driven out of other parts of the country, which I think the folks up north are doing a pretty good job of keeping them on the run, our sense is they'll go back to where they know best.

"There is a fair number that come out of the Al-Anbar province, and fought us pretty hard here. So if they are on the run, our expectation will be they'll move back here," he said.

However, he said locals have been quick to report them to the police.

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