British armored vehicles broke down the wall of a jail in the southern city of Basra during a raid to free two British soldiers who were later found in the custody of local militiamen elsewhere in the city. Britain's defense minister yesterday defended the raid as "absolutely right."
Also yesterday, a US official said that a suicide bomber killed four Americans -- a Diplomatic Security agent and three private security agents -- in the northern city of Mosul. No other details were provided by the official who spoke anonymously because he was not authorized to release the information.
After the day of violence in Basra on Monday, British authorities said their soldiers were being held illegally and that their captors had refused an order from the Iraqi Interior Minister for their release. The commander of the operation to free the pair sought to minimize the extent of destruction at the jail.
"Minor damage was caused to the prison compound wall and to the house in which our two soldiers were held," said Brigadier John Lorimer, commander of the 12 Mechanized Brigade.
Daylight pictures from the jail yesterday showed a concrete wall broken through, several cars crushed -- apparently by armored vehicles -- and a number of prefabricated structures demolished.
Mohammed al-Waili, the governor of Basra province, condemned the British for raiding the prison, an act he called "barbaric, savage and irresponsible"
"A British force of more than 10 tanks backed by helicopters attacked the central jail and destroyed it. This is an irresponsible act," al-Waili said.
British Defense Minister John Reid said laws under which the Iraqi government was given sovereignty in the summer of last year require that coalition forces detained by Iraqi authorities must be handed over to the US-led multinational force.
"I understand also that the Minister of the Interior, at the highest level, instructed that they should be [handed over], that the local judicial authorities said the same," Reid told the British Broadcasting Corporation.
"And that is why in the course of the day, while we were negotiating, in view of that fact that they weren't handed over, we got increasingly worried and the commander on the spot, with hindsight, was absolutely right to do what he did, because we discovered they weren't in the police station, they were somewhere else, but are now safe," said Reid.
Reid's comments contradicted earlier Defense Ministry statements in which British authorities said the two soldiers were freed through negotiations.
Aquil Jabbar, an Iraqi television cameraman who lives across the street from the jail, said about 150 Iraqi prisoners fled as British commandos stormed inside to rescued their comrades. Iraqi and British officials said that was not true.
While the Shiite-dominated south of Iraq, where 8,500 British troops are based, has been far quieter than Sunni regions to the north, Britons have come under increasingly frequent attacks in recent weeks. The British military has reported 96 deaths since the war began in 2003.
That compares with the deaths of 1,899 Americans who are stationed nearer the violent insurgent regions around Baghdad and stretching west to the Syrian border.
The latest violence in the oil city of Basra, 545km south of the capital, began early Monday when local authorities reported arresting the two Britons, described as special forces commandos dressed in civilian clothing, for allegedly shooting two Iraqi policemen, one of whom reportedly died.
British armor then encircled the jail where the two Britons were held.
Television cameramen from Arab satellite broadcasters in the Persian Gulf were allowed to photograph the two men, who appeared to be Westerners and were sitting on the floor in the jail in blue jeans and T-shirts, their hands tied behind their backs.
One of the men had a bandage covering most of the top of his head, the other had blood on his clothes.
Outside the jail, a melee broke out in the streets as angry demonstrators attacked the encircling British armor with stones and Molotov cocktails. During the chaos, one British soldier could be seen scrambling for his life from a burning Warrior armored fighting vehicle and the rock-throwing mob.
Press Association reported that three British soldiers were hurt during the violence, but said none of their injuries was life-threatening. Iraqi authorities said three demonstrators were killed and 15 others wounded in the skirmishes.
Lorimer, the brigade commander, claimed Monday's violence was blown out of proportion, saying the scene made for "graphic television viewing" but that "this was a small, unrepresentative crowd of about 200 to 300 in a city of 1.5 million."
Tensions have been mounting in Basra for some weeks.
On Friday, a local commander of al-Mahdi Army, a militia loyal to the radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, was arrested, prompting a demonstration by militiamen demanding his release.
Then, later Sunday, an Iraqi journalist working for the New York Times was killed after men claiming to be police officers took him from his home, the newspaper said.
DOUBLE-MURDER CASE: The officer told the dispatcher he would check the locations of the callers, but instead headed to a pizzeria, remaining there for about an hour A New Jersey officer has been charged with misconduct after prosecutors said he did not quickly respond to and properly investigate reports of a shooting that turned out to be a double murder, instead allegedly stopping at an ATM and pizzeria. Franklin Township Police Sergeant Kevin Bollaro was the on-duty officer on the evening of Aug. 1, when police received 911 calls reporting gunshots and screaming in Pittstown, about 96km from Manhattan in central New Jersey, Hunterdon County Prosecutor Renee Robeson’s office said. However, rather than responding immediately, prosecutors said GPS data and surveillance video showed Bollaro drove about 3km
‘MOTHER’ OF THAILAND: In her glamorous heyday in the 1960s, former Thai queen Sirikit mingled with US presidents and superstars such as Elvis Presley The year-long funeral ceremony of former Thai queen Sirikit started yesterday, with grieving royalists set to salute the procession bringing her body to lie in state at Bangkok’s Grand Palace. Members of the royal family are venerated in Thailand, treated by many as semi-divine figures, and lavished with glowing media coverage and gold-adorned portraits hanging in public spaces and private homes nationwide. Sirikit, the mother of Thai King Vajiralongkorn and widow of the nation’s longest-reigning monarch, died late on Friday at the age of 93. Black-and-white tributes to the royal matriarch are being beamed onto towering digital advertizing billboards, on
POWER ABUSE WORRY: Some people warned that the broad language of the treaty could lead to overreach by authorities and enable the repression of government critics Countries signed their first UN treaty targeting cybercrime in Hanoi yesterday, despite opposition from an unlikely band of tech companies and rights groups warning of expanded state surveillance. The new global legal framework aims to bolster international cooperation to fight digital crimes, from child pornography to transnational cyberscams and money laundering. More than 60 countries signed the declaration, which means it would go into force once ratified by those states. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres described the signing as an “important milestone,” and that it was “only the beginning.” “Every day, sophisticated scams destroy families, steal migrants and drain billions of dollars from our economy...
Tens of thousands of people on Saturday took to the streets of Spain’s eastern city of Valencia to mark the first anniversary of floods that killed 229 people and to denounce the handling of the disaster. Demonstrators, many carrying photos of the victims, called on regional government head Carlos Mazon to resign over what they said was the slow response to one of Europe’s deadliest natural disasters in decades. “People are still really angry,” said Rosa Cerros, a 42-year-old government worker who took part with her husband and two young daughters. “Why weren’t people evacuated? Its incomprehensible,” she said. Mazon’s
RSS