Disgust over US beheading video

The international community reacted with disgust on Wednesday at American Nick Berg's beheading shown in a video on an Al-Qaeda-linked website.

The international community reacted with disgust Wednesday at an American's beheading in Iraq as shown on an Al-Qaeda-linked website, as US legislators readied to view unpublished abuse pictures from US-run prisons.

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In the latest violence on the ground, at least nine fighters of a militia loyal to radical Shiite cleric Moqtada Sadr were killed in overnight clashes with US forces in the holy city of Karbala.

The deaths came during a large-scale military operation near a mosque occupied by militiamen in the centre of the city, witnesses said.

The White House vowed the United States would hunt down those who carried out the grisly beheading of Nick Berg, a businessman from Pennsylvania who had been missing in Iraq since mid-April.

"It shows the true nature of the enemies of freedom," spokesman Scott McClellan said. "They have no regard for the lives of innocent men, women and children. We will pursue those who are responsible and bring them to justice."

US lawmakers demanded the Arab world condemn the killing of the American civilian as strongly as they had condemned abuse of prisoners by US troops at Baghdad's Abu Ghraib jail.

"I am eagerly awaiting public apologies and condemnation from leaders in the Arab world expressing their own personal outrage at the barbaric murder of Nick Berg, an innocent civilian," said Representative Tom Tancredo of Colorado.

In a grainy video on an Islamist website, Berg was shown being decapitated with a large knife by a group of masked men who claimed their action was in revenge for the abuse of Iraqi prisoners.

The video of Berg's killing was entitled "Abu Mussab al-Zarqawi slaughtering an American", though it was not clear if the wanted Jordanian operative of Osama bin Laden's Al-Qaeda network was involved.

After the killing, shouts of "Allahu akbar" (God is great) are heard and then the men hold up the head up to the camera. Berg's remains were found Saturday by US troops along a road near Baghdad.

British Prime Minister Tony Blair's spokesman said, "This was a truly barbaric act and there is no justification for this kind of act in a civilized world."

Australian Foreign Minister Alexander Downer said, "There's no excuse for what those Americans have been doing in those prisons but there's no doubt that some of the people they're dealing with are barbaric."

The "depraved" beheading will not force Australian troops out of Iraq, Australia's Prime Minister John Howard said.

Japan called for the swift arrest of those who carried out the "merciless" killing. "It was an unforgivable act and we strongly condemn it," foreign ministry spokesman Hatsuhisa Takashima told AFP.

The two leading Arab satellite channels, Al-Jazeera and Al-Arabiya, Wednesday continued broadcasting harrowing images from the video showing Berg but only before his beheading.

The execution triggered condemnation and excuses on the streets of Baghdad on Wednesday.

"From what we have seen, it was a natural reaction to the human rights violations at Abu Ghraib. What the Americans are doing now is terrible," said one woman, a 45-year-old dentist.

But house painter Ali Abu Nabi, 29, said: "He was a human being and he came to Iraq on a mission to help Iraqis."

In the prisoner abuse scandal, the US general who authored a damning report on mistreatment of detainees at Abu Ghraib told a congressional panel Tuesday there was no evidence of a policy or direct order for such action.

"I believe that they did it on their own volition and I believe that they collaborated with several (military intelligence) interrogators at the lower level" Major General Antonio Taguba told the Senate Armed Services Committee.

Taguba said that there was a "failure in leadership, from the brigade commander on down ... Lack of discipline, no training whatsoever, and no supervision," were the main causes.

US lawmakers were Wednesday to be given a private viewing of unpublished pictures of abuse, while a US television network was to broadcast a video shot by a US soldier inside Abu Ghraib.

The Senate Armed Services Committee said the Defense Department agreed to make the images available privately only over a three-hour period. They would then be returned to the Pentagon because they are evidence in a criminal case.

CBS television said it plans to broadcast a video diary filmed by a US soldier inside Abu Ghraib and at Camp Bucca in southern Iraq, showing the conditions in which Iraqis are held.

In another key development, US President George W. Bush slapped sanctions on Syria, partly for "undermining" US efforts in Iraq, as wanted cleric Sadr offered to end his rebellion if the coalition agreed to talks.

Bush accused Syria of "supporting terrorism, continuing its occupation of Lebanon, pursuing weapons of mass destruction and missile programs, and undermining United States and international efforts" in Iraq.

The new sanctions include a freeze on certain Syrian assets in the United States and limits on exports of goods, including weaponry.

The US military and local hospital sources, meanwhile, said between nine and 25 militiamen of Sadr's Mehdi Army were killed in clashes with US forces overnight in Karbala.

A US military official in Baghdad gave the death toll of 25, adding that seven American soldiers were wounded.

Earlier the director of a hospital in Karbala, Hassan Nasrallah, said, "Nine militiamen were killed and seven people, including two Iranian pilgrims, were injured during the clashes which were in the centre of the city."

Coalition forces launched a large-scale military operation near a mosque occupied by Shiite militiamen, witnesses said. Access to the city centre was sealed off on Wednesday morning by coalition roadblocks.

Underlining the mortal danger also facing foreign civilians in Iraq, four Filipino civilian contractors were killed in a mortar attack Tuesday on a US air base in northern Iraq, Philippines President Gloria Arroyo said.

The attack took place at Balad, in the so-called Sunni triangle.