KUWAIT CITY, 26 January 2003 — Shots were reportedly fired yesterday morning near a US military convoy on the outskirts of Kuwait city, but the circumstances surrounding the incident remained unclear and no injuries were reported, US and Kuwaiti officials said.
“There is a report that shots were fired in the vicinity of a US military convoy” at around 8:15 a.m. (0515 GMT) on Sixth Ring Road, along the southern edge of the city, US military spokesman Capt. David Connolly told the Associated Press.
Connolly did not say where the report came from and said he could not confirm its veracity nor whether the military convoy was the target.
A Kuwaiti Interior Ministry spokesman, speaking on condition of anonymity, said he also received information about the reported incident. “They (the Americans) heard shots being fired but we don’t know from where or if they were the targets,” he said.
Another unnamed Kuwaiti security official, speaking to the state-owned Kuwait News Agency, said the shooting reports were “baseless.”
Sgt. 1st Class David Dismukes, a US military spokesman, said that, according to an initial report, the shots were fired from a car, adding that no injuries have been reported. No further details, including information on who fired the reported shots, were immediately available.
Later yesterday, Gen. Tommy Franks, the US Central Command chief, met with Kuwait’s interior minister, Sheikh Mohammed Khaled Al-Sabah, while on a brief visit to Kuwait. A ministry statement said they discussed “security matters of common interest.” The general, who would lead any possible war on Iraq, also met with Defense Minister Sheikh Jaber Mubarak Al-Sabah.
A suspected extremist on Tuesday ambushed a car carrying two men from San Diego, California, shooting one dead and injuring the other. (AP)
