BASRA, March 29: A British official in southern Iraq said on Saturday four or five British soldiers had been kidnapped in Basra on Friday night.

“They were kidnapped there last night,” the officer in the 2nd Royal Tank Regiment, on the edge of the besieged city, said.

A spokesman at the US-led war headquarters in Qatar said British forces had gone into Basra to assess the level of resistance from forces loyal to President Saddam Hussein but said there were no reports of missing troops.

“There are no reports of any soldiers missing,” said Group Captain Al Lockwood.

Basra, Iraq’s second city, is ringed by US and British tanks, artillery and armoured personnel carriers. On Friday British officials said Iraqi forces fired on about 2,000 civilians trying to flee fighting and a humanitarian crisis.

“We’re continuing to probe into the city to find out the disposition of these paramilitary forces,” Lockwood said.—Reuters