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BAGHDAD, Iraq (CNN) -- With the deaths of 11 U.S. military personnel this weekend, the American military's death toll for October stands at 86 -- the highest of the year.
Attacks across the Iraqi capital Sunday killed five U.S. soldiers, and five Marines died in fighting in Anbar province, west of Baghdad, on Saturday and a soldier was killed in enemy action in Salaheddin province.
An international police liaison officer working for the U.S. military also died in a roadside bomb attack Sunday in Baghdad. The officer's nationality was not released.
The year's previous highest monthly death toll was in April, when 76 U.S. troops were killed.
The highest U.S. monthly death toll of the war -- 137 deaths -- occurred in November 2004 during the offensive on the volatile Anbar city of Falluja.
The number of U.S. troop deaths stands at 2,792 since the Iraq war began in 2003. Seven American contractors of the military also have died.
Bombs target shoppers before end of Ramadan
The latest deaths come as Iraq endures an uptick in sectarian and insurgent violence. Attacks have increased during the holy month of Ramadan, which ends this week.
At least 12 Iraqis died in violence Monday in Baghdad, including six civilians, Iraqi emergency police said.
A bomb in a parked car detonated on Palestine Street in the eastern part of the capital, killing one civilian and wounding 13, police said. Shortly afterward, a car bomb went off in a busy market in the western neighborhood of Hurriya, killing four civilians and wounding six.
Both attacks targeted Iraqi civilians shopping for the Eid al-Fitr holiday marking the end of Ramadan.
An average of 43 Iraqis per day have been killed during Ramadan, which began in late September, according to a count by The Associated Press. This figure compares with an average daily death toll of about 27 since April 2005, the AP said.
Earlier Monday, a roadside bomb killed two policemen and wounded four others in western Baghdad's Ghazaliya neighborhood.
Gunmen opened fire on a car carrying members of security services for Iraq's oil facilities, killing four in the northern Baghdad neighborhood of Fadhel.
Gunmen also stormed a hairdresser's shop in the eastern Baghdad neighborhood of Zayouna, killing a woman who was the shop's owner.
White House denies 'stay-the-course' strategy
As the bloodshed rages in Iraq two weeks before U.S. midterm elections, the White House on Monday said that its policy for the war "has never been a stay-the-course strategy."
"Strategically, we think it's very important that we stay in Iraq and we win in Iraq," White House senior counselor Dan Bartlett told CBS' "The Early Show." "And if we were to cut and run and go and leave that country too early it would be a disaster for American policy.
"But what we aren't doing is sitting there with our heads in the sand. We're completely changing and making tactical changes on a week-by-week basis as we respond to the enemy's reactions to our strategies."
Earlier, the White House had downplayed a Sunday New York Times article reporting the United States is drafting a "timetable" for the Iraqi government to deal with sectarian violence and help secure country.
The Times article said that Iraq was being asked for the first time to "agree to a schedule of specific milestones, like disarming sectarian militias, and to a broad set of other political, economic and military benchmarks." A blueprint would be presented to Irqi Prime Minister Nuri al-Maliki before the year's end, according to the paper.
With pressure growing in the United States and Britain to change strategy, Iraq's deputy prime minister urged the international community not "to cut and run" as he visited with British Prime Minister Tony Blair in London, Reuters reported.
"The fate of Iraq is vital to the future of the Middle East and the world order," Barham Saleh, the Iraqi official, said, according to Reuters.
Saleh said the Iraqi government was seeking to speed up the process of taking control of the country's security, the news agency said.
Other developments
# The Iraqi Defense Ministry imposed a curfew Monday for the southeastern city of Amara after fighting last week between police and the Mehdi Army militia loyal to anti-American Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr. The curfew took effect Monday morning and will be in place until further notice, police said. Amara, the provincial capital of Maysan province, remains quiet after clashes killed at least 16 and wounded 90 others, a hospital official said. Amara is in the heart of the Shiite-dominated south near the Iraq-Iran border.
# U.S.-led coalition forces killed five suspected insurgents Monday during a raid on a building south of Balad, north of Baghdad, the U.S. military said. Coalition forces believed "several suspected terrorists" were inside the building, according to the military.
# Gunmen ambushed two busloads of Iraqi police recruits Sunday in Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, killing at least 13 and kidnapping dozens of others, security officials said. The attackers planted roadside bombs, which struck at least one of the buses. They then opened fire on the recruits, the Iraqi Interior Ministry said. The Iraqi army clashed with gunmen for hours, a security official said. After the attack, Iraqi police started to collect bodies but discovered -- after a bomb exploded near one of the corpses -- that the attackers had left an explosive next to each body, the Interior Ministry said. The police then called for the U.S. military, which defused 15 bombs.
# A senior U.S. State Department diplomat apologized Sunday for having told the Arab satellite network Al-Jazeera on Saturday that there is a strong possibility history will show the United States displayed "arrogance" and "stupidity" in its handling of the Iraq war. Alberto Fernandez is director of the Office of Press and Public Diplomacy in the Bureau of Near East Affairs.
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