BAGHDAD, March 30: Iraq said on Sunday that it shot down two US helicopters, killing at least two crew, and said that enemy troops killed in the fighting would be buried on the battlefield.

“Iraqi tribesmen and other fighters downed an Apache helicopter and killed two pilots,” Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf told a news conference of fighting near the southern city of Basra in the past day. The Pentagon said it had no reports of downed aircraft.

Sahaf said that Iraqi forces downed another helicopter in Khazaf, central Iraq. The fate of the crew was unclear.

Sahaf said that the two Apache crew were buried in line with US traditions and that other enemy dead would also be similarly buried.

US warships on way to gulf: Three US warships passed through the Suez Canal on Sunday on their way to the Gulf to join the US and British military deployments for the Iraq war, port authorities said.

They were identified as the USS Anzio, a guided missile cruiser, the Cape St George, a guided missile destroyer, and the USS Mitscher, an advanced Aegis-type destroyer.

Four US warships and two attack submarines on Saturday passed through the canal into the Mediterranean, where a naval task force is deployed and engaged in launching air strikes on Iraq.—Reuters/AFP