"Two persons wearing Arab uniforms opened fire at a police station in Basra. A police patrol followed the attackers and captured them to discover they were two British soldiers," an Interior Ministry source told Xinhua. The two soldiers were using a civilian car packed with explosives, the source said.

Here are the two while in Iraqi police custody. Reuters appended a note to each photo over the wire: "ATTENTION EDITORS - THE BRITISH GOVERNMENT REQUESTS THAT THE IDENTIFICATION OF THIS MAN IS NOT REVEALED, EITHER VIA PIXELLATION OF THEIR FACES OR BY NOT PUBLISHING THE PHOTOS."

As you probably know, they didn't remain in custody for long:

British forces using tanks broke down the walls of the central jail in the southern city of Basra late Monday and freed two Britons, allegedly undercover commandos, who had been arrested on charges of shooting two Iraqi policemen.

Witnesses said about 150 Iraqi prisoners also fled the jail.

Violence flared earlier in the day as demonstrators hurled stones and Molotov cocktails at British tanks; at least four people were killed.

The British Defense Ministry spun, but found it difficult to maneuver with its pants about its ankles. "We‘ve heard nothing to suggest we stormed the prison," a defense ministry spokesman in London said. "We understand there were negotiations." When it found some equilibrium, it changed its story to better comport with the undeniables: "We understand that the authorities ordered their release. Unfortunately they weren't released and we became concerned for their safety and as a result a Warrior infantry fighting vehicle broke down the perimeter wall in one place."

These hard men, likely SAS ops, must have had some stories to tell, otherwise tanks would not have negotiated their way through the prison walls of Britain's reputed hosts so soon after their capture.
http://rigorousintuition.blogspot.com/2005...on-killing.html



Thanks to JackRiddler from DU.