US marine confirmed dead in shooting

Two gunmen killed a US marine and injured a second American during war games on a Kuwaiti island today.

The gunmen were killed by US forces.

“One US Marine is dead and one injured following a shooting incident” in Kuwait, said a terse statement released by the US Navy’s Fifth Fleet headquarters in Bahrain.

Their names were withheld pending notification of their next of kin. The statement said an investigation was underway and provided no further details.

The shooting occurred on Failaka Island off Kuwait’s coast.

About 1,900 US marines and sailors are taking part in a ground, air and naval training exercise with the military of their Kuwaiti hosts.

Washington has said the games, dubbed Eager Mace 2002, are routine and not related to any possible war to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

In Washington, a Pentagon spokesman said the two Marines were involved in a live-fire exercise and “were fired upon by unknown assailants.”

Lieutenant Colonel Dave Lapan said it appeared the two unidentified assailants were civilians.

The Marines were taken to medical facilities nearby, where one died, the Fifth Fleet said.

Kuwaiti Ministry of Defence spokesman Brigadier Ahmed al-Rahmani could not immediately name or provide the nationalities of the two dead gunmen.

Failaka Island is about 30 miles east of Kuwait City and about the same distance from the southernmost tip of Iraq.

The two-week war games began on October 1 after the amphibious transport ships Mount Vernon and the Denver arrived in Kuwaiti waters and started unloading 1,000 Marines and their equipment. .

American and Kuwaiti forces have been training together since the end of the US-led Gulf War that liberated the small oil-rich state from a seven-month Iraqi occupation.