US prisoner of war rescued in Iraq

1.15pm

UPDATE - A US Army prisoner of war has been rescued in Iraq, a US military spokesman said today.

"Coalition forces have conducted a successful rescue mission of a US Army prisoner of war held captive in Iraq, Brigadier General Vincent Brooks told reporters in a prepared statement.

"The soldier has been returned to a Coalition-controlled area."

Brooks gave no further details but said more information would be released as soon as possible.

CNN identified the rescued person as Jessica Lynch, 19, from Palestine, West Virginia. CNN quoted Lynch's father as saying she had been taken to hospital.

It said in an unconfirmed report that Lynch had been rescued from Nassiriya, where five members of the US 507th Maintenance Company went missing and were later shown on Iraqi state television on March 23.

This came as US warplanes bombed a presidential compound in Baghdad where President Saddam Hussein's son Qusay has his headquarters, a Reuters witness said.

Reuters correspondent Samia Nakhoul said two bombs hit the compound near the Tigris River, where Iraq's elite Republican Guards also have offices. The compound has been bombed several times before in recent days.

Meanwhile a group of journalists who disappeared from a Baghdad hotel a week ago turned up safe but tired in Jordan on Tuesday (Wednesday NZT) saying they had been held in an Iraqi jail but were not physically harmed.

"We were in Abu Ghraib prison for seven or eight days. There were no specific charges. It wasn't much fun but we were not physically hurt and we are very happy to be out," said Matthew McAllester, 33, shortly after crossing the border.

McAllester, a reporter for the US newspaper Newsday, was speaking from a four-wheel drive in Jordan's desert town of Ruweished, near the border.

Moises Saman, 29, a Newsday photographer was also in the vehicle, along with freelance photographer Molly Bingham, 34, of Louisville, Kentucky, and Danish freelance photographer Johan Spanner.

A fifth member of the group, who McAllester said had been in prison as well, did not give his name.

"We are just really tired right now," Saman said, adding that members of the group had spoken to their families after crossing the border.

The group made few other comments during the late night stop in Ruweished, saying they were keen to get to the Jordanian capital Amman to rest before commenting further.

"The single most important thing is that we understand that there were many people who were trying their very hardest to get us out, and I think I speak for everyone that we are all incredibly grateful," McAllester said.

US editors, civil rights leader Jesse Jackson and relatives of the three missing US-based journalists had appealed to the Iraqi government to provide information.

Newsday issued a statement earlier on Tuesday saying the group had turned up at the border. McAllester telephoned Newsday foreign editor Dele Olojede at 1:06pm (06.06 NZT Wednesday) to say the pair had been released by Iraqi authorities.

McAllester grew up in Edinburgh, Scotland, and Saman was born in Peru and raised in Barcelona, Spain.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists said two employees from Britain's Independent Television News, cameraman Fred Nerac, a French national, and translator Hussein Othman, of Lebanon, were still missing in the war. They were last seen in southern Iraq on March 22 when their car was fired upon, killing ITN correspondent Terry Lloyd.

Australian journalist Ian McPhedran was expelled from Baghdad for filing an eyewitness report on a US missile strike on Iraq's Information Ministry, his newspaper, Sydney's Daily Telegraph, reported.

McAllester is United Nations correspondent for Newsday, one of the largest daily newspapers in the United States that serves Long Island and New York City. The paper has won 17 Pulitzer Prizes.

McAllester has previously worked in the Middle East, covering the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. He and Saman also covered the US-led war in Afghanistan that started in October 2001 after the Sept. 11 attacks.

Bingham, whose family founded two Kentucky papers, worked as official photographer for former Vice President Al Gore during his failed presidential bid in 2000 against President George W Bush, and has covered conflicts worldwide.


- REUTERS

Herald Feature: Iraq war