U.S. troops defeated Iraqi forces at the southern city of An Nasiriyah in the sharpest engagement of the war so far, U.S. Central Command said Sunday. It said some 10 soldiers were killed and 12 were reported missing after Iraqis ambushed an army supply convoy.
Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks said the ambush came after allied forces met a unit outside of An Nasiriyah that showed signs it was prepared to surrender. The forces came under fire while preparing to accept what appeared to be surrendering forces.
"We of course will be much more cautious in the way we view the battlefield as a result of some of these incidents," said Army Lt. Gen. John Abizaid.
"It was a tough day of fighting for the coalition," Brooks said, adding that the Iraqis destroyed the six coalition vehicles in the ambush. Abizaid called the fighting there the "sharpest engagement of the war thus far."
Iraqi military officials claimed earlier that 25 American soldiers were killed in the operation in An Nasiriyah, a major crossing point over the Euphrates River northwest of Basra.
Abizaid, speaking at the Qatar headquarters of U.S. Central Command, said he thought fewer than 10 troops were killed in the fighting and that "a number" of troops were wounded.
He said coalition forces encountered significant resistance in the city.
Brooks said the military believed the 12 missing soldiers were "in the custody of the irregular forces that conducted the ambush, and their status is not known." Abizaid said the captors were either Republican Guard forces or Iraqi guerrillas.
Abizaid said some of the 12 missing soldiers "ended up on Baghdad TV."
Abizaid said the airing of the footage by Iraqi television of the captured troops was a violation of the Geneva conventions because Iraqi TV is a state television station and questioning the prisoners was an effort to humiliate them.
"It is not right, and we will hold them accountable for their actions," he said.
When asked about the allied timetable for advancing on Iraq, Abizaid "we are on track. We will arrive in the vicinity of Baghdad soon."
On his part, Iraqi Defense Minister Sultan Hashim Ahmed said that the bodies of U.S. soldiers were lying on a battlefield near An Nasiriyah.
"A number of Americans were killed and their corpses are still abandoned in the area of Khomeiteh in front of our forces," he said. He added that Iraq had destroyed 10 tanks and 20 armored personnel carriers in fighting across southern Iraq and shot down one unmanned spy plane.
U.S. Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld noted that under the Geneva Conventions governing prisoners of war, "It's illegal to do things to POWs that are humiliating to those prisoners." He said that filming prisoners was outlawed under the Geneva Convention.
U.S. President George W. Bush said Sunday he had been briefed on the reported capture of the prisoners and said he expected them to be treated humanely.
"We don't know all the details yet. We do know that we expect them to be treated humanely just like we are treating the prisoners of theirs that we capture humanely," Bush told reporters.
The International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) said Sunday that the Iraqi footage is in violation of the Geneva Convention. "Article 13 of the Third Geneva Convention says clearly that prisoners of war must at all times be protected... against insult and public curiosity," said ICRC spokeswoman Nada Doumani.
"It is quite clear," she said. "Whenever you do something contrary to the Convention it is a violation of the Convention."
Despite the accusations, Iraq said it would respect the Geneva Convention. "Iraq will not harm the captured prisoners of war," the Iraqi defense minister told a news conference. "It will treat them in accordance with the Geneva Convention on prisoners of war." (Albawaba.com)
© 2003 Al Bawaba (www.albawaba.com)
