
                         Roanoke Times
                 Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.

DATE: SATURDAY, March 2, 1991                   TAG: 9103020296
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL                    PAGE: A-7   EDITION: METRO 
SOURCE: The New York Times
DATELINE: DHAHRAN, SAUDI ARABIA                                LENGTH: Medium

DANGER PERSISTS AT FRONT/ 2 KILLED BY MINES; AMERICANS BLOW UP IRAQI TROOPS'

Despite a provisional cease-fire, the battlefields of the Persian Gulf War were not quite quiet Friday, the second day since President Bush halted the fighting, and there were reports thousands of Iraqi stragglers were still in the combat zone.

An army doctor and a woman serving as a medical specialist were killed Friday morning by mines as they tried to assist in taking Iraqi prisoners, and a bus carrying Iraqi troops was destroyed by American soldiers at a roadblock after the Iraqis opened fire on them, an American military spokesman said.

Brig. Gen. Richard Neal said a medical team was driving through Iraq shortly after midnight when they saw a group of Iraqis surrendering.

They drove over to offer their help, he said, and their vehicle hit a mine, killing a doctor. The medical specialist got out to help, stepped on a mine and was also killed. A second doctor, who stayed in the vehicle, was not hurt.

One of the main issues to be discussed at a meeting between allied and Iraqi commanders will be Bush's demand that Baghdad provide full information on mine fields.

"The battlefield is still very dangerous," Neal said.

In the second incident, American troops from the 24th Infantry Division (Mechanized), manning a guard post on Highway 8 in the Euphrates River valley, stopped two Iraqi buses and a flatbed truck heading west toward Baghdad.

The first bus halted, Neal said, but soldiers in the second opened fire. The Americans blew up the bus and took nine prisoners.

Allied officials said the second incident and several smaller ones probably resulted from Iraqi troops failing to get the message that hostilities had been suspended. They said, in fact, that there was still a lot of confusion all over the battlefield, especially in remote parts of it.

Thousands of Iraqi soldiers were bypassed as allied columns rolled forward, and American commanders think it may be a week or more before they emerge from their bunkers or disabled vehicles because they have run out of food or water.

by CNB