Iraq said Saturday that Iraqi tribal fighters and members of the ruling Baath Party destroyed five U.S. tanks and a number of military vehicles in battles in the Bat-ha region between the cities of al-Nasseria and Samawah south of Iraq. Information Minister Mohammad Saeed al-Sahhaf told reporters in Baghdad, that Iraqi tribal fighters were also fiercely fighting U.S. and British columns south of Nasseria, 350 kilometers south of Baghdad, and Souq al-Shiyoukh. "The U.S. forces in Nasseria had to retreat because of the Iraqi fighters' fire, and fighting between the two sides is fiercely continuing until this moment," said al-Sahhaf.There was fighting yesterday, but I think it's reported over now...
Al-Sahhaf denied in his daily briefing reports that U.S and British forces had taken control of the port of Um Qasr and the strategic city of Faw in the deep south of Iraq. He said: "The invading forces did not succeed in penetrating Um Qasr," which overlooks the Persian Gulf.
"That's someplace else they captured. Maybe it's Bombay..."
The minister, dressed in the military-styled uniform of the ruling Baath Party, added that the Iraqi forces were "fixed in their positions," denying that any Iraqi soldier had been taken prisoner by the U.S. and British forces. He accused the forces of kidnapping Iraqi civilians and filming them on television as Iraqi prisoners of war "after these forces succeeded in putting a foothold in the city of Faw." He insisted that Iraqi artillery was "until this moment pounding the American and British forces in that area."
"Yep. We're beating the crap out them Merkins and Limeys..."
On the damage from Friday night's intensive U.S.-British bombardment of Baghdad, al-Sahhaf said 207 Iraqi civilians were injured, most of them women and children