Final thrust

But I and other correspondents travelling around Baghdad saw no sign of US troops or armour inside the city. Trailers and buses full of Saddam8217;s Fidayeen, the black-clad paramilitary forces under the command of Saddam8217;s eldest son Uday, drove south on one thoroughfare.

8220;Move out of the way,8221; they shouted as they sped away from a military compound, touting AK-47s and rocket-propelled grenade launchers and clutching Chinese-made hand grenades.

Armoured personnel carriers were also driving south. Driving freely around the southern outskirts and the main security buildings of the Iraqi capital, I saw Iraqi forces preparing for battle and boarded-up shops.

Heavy artillery and rocket launchers were positioned in the Dawra area, home to the main oil refinery feeding Baghdad and an area where a US spokesman said American tanks drove early on Saturday on a reconnaissance mission.

Iraq denied any US forces were in Baghdad and said its troops had driven the Americans from the airport 8212; a claim that a US military spokesman said was groundless.

Saddam Hussein, in a message read on television by his Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf, urged Iraqi armed forces and people to step up attacks on the US and British invasion forces. 8220;The criminals will be humiliated,8221; the message said. 8220;To hurt the enemy more, raise the level of your attacks.8221;

US Major-General Victor Renuart accepted in Qatar that the 8220;fight is far from over8221;. US Marine gunnery sergeant Mark Woodward said that his unit had been told there had been a suicide bombing at the airport: 8220;The last order we just got said there was another suicide bombing at the airport, so be especially vigilant at roadblocks.8221; Renuart couldn8217;t confirm the incident.

An Iraqi military spokesman said hundreds of US troops had been killed in the airport fighting. In Qatar, US spokesman Captain Frank Thorp spoke of sporadic but lively resistance. 8220;There were firefights8230;it was pretty intense.8221; He claimed the push into Baghdad was 8220;more than a patrol that goes in and comes back out8221;.

US military sources said at least 20 Abrams tanks and 10 Bradley fighting vehicles rumbled up a southern highway through the city8217;s Dawra suburb before swinging West and linking up with troops at the airport.

Four US soldiers were wounded, one of them shot in the head, in fighting in and around Baghdad, and an unidentified Iraqi general was captured, US military sources said. Rocket-propelled grenades damaged one US Tank. US forces called in air support to attack Iraqi tanks on the northern edge of the airport.

The International Committee of the Red Cross said hundreds wounded Iraqis had been admitted to Baghdad8217;s hospitals after US troops reached the city. Baghadad witnessed a blistering overnight air and artillery barrage against its eastern flank.

In Kerbala, helicopter-borne troops of the101st Airborne Division landed on the western edge of town and moved in beside a tank battalion with Apache attack helicopters overhead.

Iraqi paramilitary forces fired assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades from city rooftops. US forces hit back using attack helicopters, artillery and heavy weapons.

In northern Iraq, US forces moved from Kurdish-held territory towards Iraqi lines defending the oil city of Mosul. In Aziziyah, based on information from a local Iraqi who described himself as a former special forces member, US Marines started digging up a suspected chemical weapons hiding place at a school on Saturday.

South of Baghdad, a US officer said first tests of a white powder found in thousands of boxes showed it was not a chemical weapon. Colonel John Peabody told Reuters that most of it appeared to be the nerve gas antidote atropine, and another chemical.

Turkey ordered the expulsion of three Iraqi diplomats on Saturday, but a Foreign Ministry official said the move was not a result of US requests to shut down Iraqi missions. Reuters