British soldiers found in shallow graves

Two British soldiers found buried in shallow desert graves in southern Iraq may have been executed, rather than killed in combat as their families were first told by the Army.

Yesterday forensic pathologists wereassisting a Military Police investigation into the causes of the deaths of Staff Sergeant Simon Cullingworth, 36, and Sapper Luke Allsopp, 24.

The men are thought to have been captured and shot when their Land Rover was ambushed on 23 March near Zubayr. Pictures of their bodies were then broadcast on al-Jazeera television, causing outrage in Britain and leading Tony Blair to claim that they had been executed.

The family of Sapper Allsopp angrily challenged the Prime Minister's version of events, saying that they trusted the Army's account that the two soldiers had died in battle.

Yesterday a Ministry of Defence spokesman said the results of post-mortem examinations of the exhumed bodies would be passed on to the Army's Special Investigation Branch, which is heading the inquiry. He said the families were being kept fully informed of all developments and he hoped to be able to give "categorical" answers to questions about how the men died in due course. Sapper Allsopp, from north London, and Sgt Cullingworth, from Essex, were both members of the 33 (EOD) Engineer Regiment, a specialist bomb disposal unit of the Royal Engineers.

On a visit to America earlier this month, Mr Blair spoke of "the release of those pictures of executed British soldiers" and condemned the decision to broadcast them as "an act of cruelty beyond comprehension". Although admitting there was no conclusive proof of how the pair died, Mr Blair's official spokesman insisted the Prime Minister had been right to say they had been executed.

But Sapper Allsopp's sister Nina, 29, told the Daily Mirror that senior officers from her brother's barracks in Wimbish, Essex, informed the family that he had been killed instantly in battle. "It makes a big difference to us knowing that he died quickly," she said.

"We can't understand why people are lying about what happened. It must be a mistake. It's important to us that people know the truth, that people know what really happened."

Military sources said yesterday that the discovery of the bodies in a shallow grave backed up Mr Blair's initial conclusion on the cause of death because soldiers who died in battle were not usually buried by the enemy.