BAGHDAD, 23 April 2004 — The United States warned Fallujah fighters yesterday its patience was running thin with the pace of arms surrender as Iraqi abductors freed three foreign hostages.

Lt. Gen. James Conway, commander of the 1st Marine Expeditionary Corps, said Fallujah fighters had only days to turn in their weapons, complaining that what had been handed over so far was a load of “junk”.

His angry statement came after a day marked by gunbattles that Marines claim left 36 fighters dead in the town west of Baghdad.

“We were not pleased at all with the turning-in that we saw yesterday, the volume probably amounted to a pickup-truckful,” said Conway.

He characterized the weapons handed over as “junk, junk I think that I wouldn’t begin to ask my Marines to fire. It probably wouldn’t be safe.”

He said he believed there were at least 200 foreign fighters inside Fallujah. “We think they are the hard core and have been the catalyst for the vast majority of the troubles in Al-Anbar province.”

“What happens next is in the hands of the negotiators,” he said, questioning whether they had the power to deliver.

“As we entered the negotiations with the prominent people around the city, we had every hope... that they could argue reasonably for a peaceful solution. That said, today we’re somehow questioning if they represent the people of Fallujah ... because it’s our estimate that the people of Fallujah have not responded well to the agreement that we made,” Conway said.

An Israeli Arab and two Swiss were the three hostages freed, a day after a Dane was confirmed as the second captive to have been murdered amid a spate of abductions.

The releases came as a leading Iraqi religious leader warned Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi to tone down his pro-US rhetoric for the sake of three Italian abductees who have been held for more than 10 days.

The Swiss nationals were released by an unknown group after being held hostage for 48 hours, Switzerland’s Foreign Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey said.

A Palestinian diplomat said Nabil Yaacub Razzuq, an Arab Israeli kidnapped earlier this month, had been freed by his captors and was in good health. Born into a Christian Palestinian family of East Jerusalem, Razzuq, 30, was employed by the US company Research Triangle Institute.

A gunman, meanwhile, shot dead a South African security guard in a Baghdad supermarket after accusing him of being Jewish.