British Soldier Killed In Iraq

LONDON, Aug 9 (AFP) - A British soldier was killed Monday during clashes with insurgents in Iraq's main southern city of Basra, the defence ministry in London said.
"I can confirm that there was a soldier killed this afternoon in Iraq. There have been a number of other casualties as well, during fighting with insurgents in our area of control," a ministry spokesman said, without elaborating.
"The situation has now calmed down," he said.
The spokesman said the victim was the ninth British soldier to die in Iraq this year.
Sixty-two British servicemen have died in total since the US-led invasion of Iraq in March 2003.
The clashes took place in the afternoon with Shiite Muslim militiamen loyal to radical cleric Moqtada Sadr, the spokesman said.
He said exchanges of fire occurred at several places in and around Basra, and a British army vehicle was destroyed.
British forces were attempting to restore calm and prevent an escalation of violence, the spokesman said, stressing that they were using force only in cases of self-defence.
Militiamen loyal to Sadr last Thursday declared holy war against British forces based in Basra after four of their comrades were arrested.
Four days of battles between Sadr's Mehdi Army and US and Iraqi government forces in Najaf, the holy Shiite city north of Basra, have left hundreds of militiamen dead according to the US military, and the unrest has fanned out across the Shiite south.
Major Ian Clooney, a British military spokesman in Basra, told BBC television's "News at Ten" that the situation in Basra late Monday remained "tense but calm".
"In Basra in particular a number of vehicles have been damaged as a result of insurgent action and unfortunately a British soldier has been killed," Clooney said.
"The situation at the moment with the onset of night remains tense but calm. The city has broadly calmed down now but what we have seen is very much the action of a minority."
He said the unrest of the last few days had been "quite out of the ordinary" from what British forces in the area had previously been experiencing.
"Over the last few months we have seen a period of relative stability where we have been able to progress the reconstruction and the rebuilding of Iraq," he said.
"The actions we have seen today and over the last few days have effectively put a temporary hold on that sort of activity," he added.