Baghdad Claims Capture of U.S. Female Soldiers

Iraq said today it is holding female American soldiers as prisoners and that it would treat them well “in accordance with the spirit of the lofty Islamic laws.”

U.S. Brig. Gen. Pat Stevens IV told reporters in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, that two American soldiers, a man and a woman, apparently were missing. The two had not been involved in the ground fighting, but were on a “transportation mission” on a road alongside an oil pipeline that ranges 25 to 75 miles south of the Saudi-Kuwait border, Stevens said.

It was the first report of a woman soldier missing in the war.

The official Iraqi News Agency, monitored in Nicosia, said the women--it did not specify a number--were among Americans and Saudis seized in the fierce battle for the abandoned Saudi border town of Khafji.

Iraq said it repelled an overnight allied counterattack on Khafji, but did not mention Saudi claims that allied troops had retaken the city.

The Iraqi News Agency said Iraqi troops still in the city were holding American and Saudi prisoners that included “female U.S. soldiers.”

“These female soldiers are being treated well by the Iraqi fighters in accordance with the traditional treatment of prisoners. They will be given good treatment in accordance with the spirit of the lofty Islamic laws,” the agency said.