Baghdad, 28 August 2003 (RFE/RL) -- The British military says a British soldier was killed in southern Iraq today. Lieutenant Commander Richard Walters said the attack happened after a British convoy was met by a crowd of people blocking a road in the town of Ali al-Sharqi near Al-Basrah.
Walters said that after warning shots were fired, two British soldiers got out of their vehicles and tried to disperse the crowd when some of them opened fire with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades. One of the soldiers was killed and a second soldier was wounded.
The military said the soldiers were reinforced from a nearby base, and they detained 10 people among the crowd.
A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition, Colonel Guy Shields, said yesterday that coalition forces are coming under attack 12 times a day on average. "It is still averaging just over a dozen attacks [per day]," he said. "If you look out over the long run, we have days where there is more, we have days where there is less."
Yesterday in Iraq, two U.S. soldiers were killed in separate attacks. One serviceman died in an attack on a convoy in Baghdad, and another was killed and three were wounded in a blast in the town of Al-Fallujah, west of the capital.
Walters said that after warning shots were fired, two British soldiers got out of their vehicles and tried to disperse the crowd when some of them opened fire with small arms and rocket-propelled grenades. One of the soldiers was killed and a second soldier was wounded.
The military said the soldiers were reinforced from a nearby base, and they detained 10 people among the crowd.
A spokesman for the U.S.-led coalition, Colonel Guy Shields, said yesterday that coalition forces are coming under attack 12 times a day on average. "It is still averaging just over a dozen attacks [per day]," he said. "If you look out over the long run, we have days where there is more, we have days where there is less."
Yesterday in Iraq, two U.S. soldiers were killed in separate attacks. One serviceman died in an attack on a convoy in Baghdad, and another was killed and three were wounded in a blast in the town of Al-Fallujah, west of the capital.