Three British soldiers killed in Iraq, one hurt ( 2003-08-23 16:17) (Agencies)
Three British soldiers were killed and one was seriously wounded Saturday
morning in the southern city of Basra, the British military reported.
Cindy
Miles weeps at the casket of her son, Army PFC Timmy Brown, Jr. of Conway,
Penn. as she is comforted by a military official after her son's
funeral services at Arlington National Cemetery in Arlington, Va. Friday,
Aug. 22, 2003. Timmy, assigned to D Company, 510th Military Intelligence
Batallion at Fort Bragg, N.C., was killed by an explosive device August
12th in Taji, Iraq. [AP] | Capt. Hisham Halawi
said the military was still collecting information and could not provide details
yet on how the soldiers were killed.
Witnesses said the soldiers were riding in a sport utility vehicle and came
under small arms fire from an unknown number of men in a pickup truck.
The deaths brought to 11 the number of Britons killed in combat since U.S.
President George W. Bush declared major fighting over on May 1.
The last combat killing of a British soldier was Aug. 14, when one died and
two were wounded in Basra when the ambulance in which they were riding was hit
by a roadside bomb.
While Basra has been relatively peaceful since Saddam Hussein's regime fell
on April 9, a large swath of the country north and west of Baghdad, the
so-called "Sunni Triangle," has been the site of a bloody guerrilla war that has
taken the lives of 65 U.S. soldiers since May 1.
The Aug. 14 killing of the British medic occurred during a weekend of violent
protests over electricity cuts and fuel shortages.
|