BAGHDAD, Iraq – Hundreds of Iraqi civilians and policemen, some waving pistols and AK-47s, rallied Wednesday in the southern city of Basra to denounce “British aggression” in the rescue of two British soldiers.
The Basra governor threatened to end all cooperation with British forces unless Prime Minister Tony Blair’s government apologizes for the deadly clash with Iraqi police.
In London, British Defense Secretary John Reid and Iraqi Prime Minister Ibrahim al-Jaafari tried to minimize the effect of the fighting, saying it would not undermine the relationship between the two nations or their determination to lead Iraq to peace and democracy.
There has been disagreement about just what happened late Monday, when British armor crashed into a jail to free two British soldiers who had been arrested by Iraqi police.
According to the British, Shiite Muslim militiamen moved the two soldiers from the jail to a private home while British officials tried to negotiate their release with Iraqi officials. After raiding the jail, the British say they rescued the soldiers in a nearby private home in the custody of Shiite militias.
Earlier that day, a crowd attacked British troops with stones and Molotov cocktails.
Troops had tried to negotiate with the crowd in Basra “but that had no effect and it became more hostile quite quickly after that,” Sgt. Eddie Pickersgill, whose face was bruised by a rock, said Wednesday.
Iraqi Interior Minister Bayan Jabr disputed the British account of the raid that followed. He told the British Broadcasting Corp. the two soldiers never left police custody or the jail, were not handed over to militants, and that the British army acted on a “rumor” when it stormed the jail.
But Basra’s governor, Mohammed al-Waili, said the two men were indeed moved from the jail. He said they were placed in the custody of the al-Mahdi Army, the militia of radical Shiite cleric Muqtada al-Sadr.
“The two British were being kept in a house controlled by militiamen when the rescue operation took place,” al-Waili said. “Police who are members of the militia group took them to a nearby house after jail authorities learned the facility was about to be stormed.”
At first, Basra police said the two British soldiers shot and killed a policeman before they were taken into custody, but on Tuesday al-Jaafari’s spokesman, Haydar al-Abadi, said the men – who were wearing civilian clothes – were grabbed for behaving suspiciously and collecting information.
Lisa Glover, a British Foreign Office spokeswoman in Baghdad, said the two soldiers “were challenged by armed men in plain clothes … and they obviously didn’t know who they were being challenged by.” But “when Iraqi police asked them to stop, they did,” she said.
She said British officials negotiated with Iraqi authorities in Basra for the release of the two soldiers with an Iraqi judge present. “When it became apparent they were no longer at the station, but had been moved elsewhere, we naturally became concerned.”
Several hours after Wednesday’s protest, Basra’s provincial council held an emergency meeting and voted unanimously “to stop dealing with the British forces working in Basra and not to cooperate with them because of their irresponsible aggression on a government facility.”
Five Iraqi civilians were killed in the fighting, including two who died of their injuries Wednesday in a hospital, and other people wounded, Iraqi authorities said.
Meanwhile, Iraqi security forces stormed a house in the center of Baghdad on Wednesday, freeing a hostage and killing five alleged insurgents. Iraqi security officers said the men had used the house as a haven and a hideout to stock weapons.
“There is a group of terrorists hiding inside the house with explosives, RPGs and hand grenades,” an Iraqi army officer told al-Iraqiya, a state-owned TV channel. As he spoke, three Iraqi soldiers fired on the house while five others rushed through the main gate, pushing tree branches away from their faces.
U.S. troops stayed on the sideline of the assault, supporting the Iraqi forces but not engaging directly. American military officials have said they are trying to rely more on Iraqi troops to maintain security.
It was not immediately clear with whom the alleged insurgents were connected, but they had a significant amount of weapons, Iraqi officials said. The officials and witnesses in the neighborhood had no information about the hostage or how he had been abducted.
Associated Press
Iraqis protest Wednesday in Basra, Iraq, demanding an apology for Monday’s attack by British forces on the jail where two British soldiers were thought to be held captive. The soldiers were later found to have been turned over to a militia, and were freed later Monday.
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