Attacks in Southern Iraq Kill 6 British Soldiers
VOA News
24 Jun 2003, 19:43 UTC
British Defense Secretary Geoff Hoon has confirmed that six British soldiers were killed and eight wounded in attacks in southern Iraq.
Mr. Hoon says the six dead were military police officers who were training local Iraqi police. He says eight troops were wounded in a separate incident when they came under hostile fire during a rescue.
Both attacks were near the city of al-Amarah, about 200 kilometers north of Basra.
U.S. Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld called the attacks a "sober reminder" that while major combat in Iraq is over, coalition forces are still involved in a dangerous war on terror.
The attack on the police station was the first major strike against British troops in Iraq since the fall of Saddam Hussein's regime in April. American soldiers have faced almost daily casualties in spite of operations designed to capture and kill what U.S. officials say are fighters loyal to Saddam Hussein.
The U.S. Central Command says U.S. soldiers were targeted in two separate attacks Tuesday. One soldier was wounded and three Iraqis were killed in a small arms firefight in Ramadi, a city west of Baghdad. And in the town of Fallujah, unidentified attackers fired rocket-propelled grenades at U.S. troops guarding a power station. One Iraqi was killed when the soldiers returned fire.
Meanwhile, top U.S. defense officials are declining to give more details about a U.S. raid on a convoy of suspected former Iraqi regime officials near the Syrian border. Mr. Rumsfeld and the head of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, General Richard Myers, say results of the raid are still being investigated. U.S. defense officials said earlier that investigators have not determined the identities of those killed when U.S. special forces attacked the convoy last Wednesday.
Some information for this report provided by AP and AFP.
|
