Jessica Lynch discharged from US Army

WASHINGTON/NEW YORK - Jessica Lynch, the badly injured US Army private and prisoner of war who was retrieved from an Iraqi hospital by American commandos, has been honourably discharged from the military, paving the way for her to tell her story directly to the public.

"She's been medically retired" due to disability from injuries, Beverly Chidel, a spokeswoman at Walter Reed Army Medical Centre, told Reuters.

Publishing sources told Reuters her discharge will allow Lynch, who became a controversial symbol of American patriotism during the war, to seal a lucrative publishing deal to tell her story and that her authorised biography could be on bookstore shelves within months.

Chidel said that Lynch was honourably discharged last Friday after returning to the medical centre from a month's leave and would be eligible for future medical treatment at military hospitals even though she did not serve the 20 years normally required for military retirement.

Lynch was given a hero's welcome when she returned to her hometown of Palestine, West Virginia, on July 22. However, the full details of her story have yet to be told since Lynch said she suffered a loss of memory after her capture.

Lynch was precluding from selling her story while on active duty but Publishers Weekly Editorial Director John Baker said she could now ink a deal within days. Publishers Alfred A Knopf, Doubleday and Simon & Schuster had already made bids to produce her authorised biography, he said.

"Every month that passes before this book's publication the less of a story this is," Baker said, adding that a deal could be signed within days.

Literary sources said the leading contender to publish Lynch's story was Random House's Knopf imprint, which has proposed a book authored by Rick Bragg. The Pulitzer Prize-winning reporter resigned from The New York Times earlier this year after allegations that he relied too heavily on the work of a freelancer in a story published under his byline.

Spokesmen for the three publishing houses either declined comment or could not immediately be reached.

The 20-year-old supply clerk was captured by Iraqi forces on March 23 near the city of Nassiriya. Eleven other US soldiers were killed and nine wounded in the incident.

Lynch was rescued by US commandos on April 1 from a hospital where she had received care from Iraqi medical personnel.

One earlier media report quoted unnamed US officials saying she fought fiercely before being captured. But Army investigators later concluded that Lynch was injured when her Humvee crashed into another vehicle in the convoy after being hit by a rocket-propelled grenade.

Their report said a tired company commander misread his assigned route and that the unit took a wrong turn and became separated from a convoy of nearly 600 other vehicles sweeping north from the Kuwait border.

Lynch's lawyer, Stephen Goodwin, told Reuters by telephone from Charleston, West Virginia, that she was continuing her rehabilitation on an out-patient basis in West Virginia.

Lynch was awarded the Bronze Star, the Purple Heart and the Prisoner of War medals.

- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq