- NEW YORK (AP) -- Graphic
video footage of a badly injured Jessica Lynch and Lori Piestewa, who may
have died shortly afterward, was taken by Iraqi state television following
the ambush of the soldiers' army convoy, NBC reported Tuesday night.
-
- The video, aired on NBC Nightly News, shows the two army
privates at the hospital where they were taken following the March 23 ambush
of the 507th Maintenance Co.
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- The tape was never aired in Iraq, NBC reported.
-
- Pr. Piestewa, her face swollen and bruised and her head
loosely bandaged, is shown as someone positions her feet and then her head
for the camera shot. Her lip is shown curling back in an apparent grimace.
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- Ms. Lynch, 20, of Palestine, W.Va., is also shown bandaged,
her lip cut.
-
- Neither appears awake or alert.
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- "I haven't watched it," Pr. Piestewa's mother,
Percy Piestewa, said when contacted by The Associated Press. "I don't
want to talk to any reporters right now."
-
- Telephone messages left with two spokespeople for Ms.
Lynch's family were not immediately returned.
-
- Iraqi doctors have previously said the women were brought
to a private clinic following the ambush, and that Pr. Piestewa, a 23-year-old
mother of two from Tuba City, Ariz., died half an hour later of severe
head injuries.
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- Ms. Lynch was rescued by U.S. forces April 1, while five
other soldiers were found about two weeks later elsewhere in Iraq. But
11 of their colleagues died during and after the ambush in Nasiriyah.
-
- Pr. Piestewa was the first U.S. female service member
to die in the war.
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- The identities of Ms. Lynch and Pr. Piestewa were verified
for NBC by Specialist Shoshana Johnson, one of the rescued soldiers.
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- "It was a little shocking to see Lori, but it also
gave me a little peace to know that they tried, they did their best for
her," Sp. Johnson, 30, of El Paso, Texas, told the network. "I
mean, it was obvious they tried to bandage her up and give her medical
care."
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- NBC told the army it had obtained the tape before airing
it so the families of the soldiers could be told first, according to MSNBC.com.
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- Defence Department spokesman Jim Turner said Tuesday
night officials were aware of the Iraqi video, but had not seen it and
did not have details about what it contained.
-
- The United States repeatedly bombed Iraqi TV studios
after they aired interviews with American prisoners of war. But this tape
survived because an employee at the state network kept it at home, NBC
reported.
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