Two British women killed in Iraq
TWO women were among four British soldiers killed in a roadside ambush in Iraq, it was revealed tonight.
The women - from the Intelligence Corps, the Queen Alexandra's Royal Army Nursing Corps - were inside a Warrior armoured vehicle returning from patrol near Basra when insurgents struck.
Two male soldiers from the Royal Army Medical Corps and 2nd Battalion The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment were also killed, along with a Kuwaiti interpreter.
A fifth soldier was seriously injured in the blast, which left a 3ft deep crater in the road. All next of kin have been informed.
Iraqis danced and sang in celebration at the scene of the horrific deaths, many stealing the dead troops' helmets and body armour as "trophies" of the tragedy.
The female victims represent the third and fourth women soldiers to die on active service since the conflict in Iraq began in 2003.
The first British woman killed while on duty was Flight Lieutenant Sarah-Jayne Mulvihill, 32, who died in May last year in a helicopter crash in Basra.
She was travelling as a passenger in a Lynx when it came down, killing her and four servicemen.
Originally from Canterbury, Kent, she was serving as a Flight Operations Officer based at RAF Benson in south Oxfordshire.
The second was Staff Sgt Sharon Elliott from South Shields, Tyne and Wear. The 34-year-old, a high-flying member of the Intelligence Corps, died during a riverboat attack last year.
Iraqis danced and sang in celebration at the scene of the horrific deaths.
A third woman, Staff Sergeant Denise Rose, 34, of the Royal Military Police, died in Iraq in 2004 but her death was not due to hostile circumstances.
The latest deaths took place when the troops and their Kuwaiti interpreter died after being hit by a roadside bomb while on a patrol west of Basra.
An MoD spokeswoman said: "It is with deep regret that we can confirm that four British soldiers and a civilian interpreter were killed in a roadside bomb attack against a Warrior patrol west of Basra."
The patrol came under attack at about 2am local time (11pm Wednesday British time) in the Hayaniyah district west of Basra, she added.
The fatalities bring the British death toll for the past week to six.
On Sunday, Kingsman Danny John Wilson, 28, of Chindip Company, 2nd Battalion, The Duke of Lancaster's Regiment, died after he was hit by small arms fire during a patrol in Basra City.
The soldier, from Workington, Cumbria, was taken to the multinational Basra Palace base, where he later died of his injuries.
The following day Rifleman Aaron Lincoln, 18, from Durham died after coming under attack from small arms fire while on a routine patrol in the Al Ashar district of central Basra.
The serviceman, of the 2nd Battalion, The Rifles, was evacuated to Basra Palace and then to the Field Hospital in the Contingency Operating Base at Basra Air Station but died later.
The British death toll in Iraq now stands at 140, six of them in the last week alone - the bloodiest period for UK servicemen since January 2005, when 10 troops died when an RAF Hercules crashed north-west of Baghdad.
