Straw welcomes reported deaths

Jack Straw said the deaths of Saddam Hussein's two sons in a fierce gun battle with US forces would provide new "reassurance to the Iraqi people".

Confirmation that Uday and Qusay Hussein were among four victims of a raid in the Northern Iraqi town of Mosul would end any lingering fears that they remained a threat to the country's security, the Foreign Secretary said.

General Ricardo Sanchez, the commander of coalition forces, said he was "certain" the brothers were dead after their bodies were identified by multiple sources.

US troops had come under attack as they swooped on a villa where they had been told the men were hiding, he told a news conference in Baghdad.

The Americans responded with heavy fire in an operation that lasted six hours and left four US soldiers injured.

Mr Straw said: "Uday and Qusay Hussein shared their father's responsibility for the many years of suffering by the Iraqi people.

"They had the opportunity to hand themselves in to justice and answer for their crimes. They refused to do this.

"It goes without saying that we would have much preferred this, but the news that Saddam's sons are no longer a threat to the security of Iraq will be a reassurance to the Iraqi people."

Shadow foreign secretary Michael Ancram, who is visiting Baghdad , said the brothers were "evil men" whose deaths would "lift a great weight" from the Iraqi people.

"They waged terror against their own people and their continued existence kept terror in the hearts of the people of Iraq even after the war ended," he told PA News from Kuwait.

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