The Arabic-language television network, monitored in Dubai, said it obtained the video following fighting at Zubayr, near the southern Iraqi city of Basra, over the past two days.

It did not say who supplied the video. Britain’s Ministry of Defense in London had no immediate comment on the Al Jazeera report.

British defense officials said earlier this week that two soldiers had been killed in action near Zubayr, which British forces stormed early on Tuesday, destroying the local headquarters of the ruling Baath Party.

British officials have also confirmed that two soldiers went missing on Monday following an attack on vehicles in the area.

The video broadcast on Al-Jazeera showed a crowd of youths jumping up and down on a captured armored vehicle, as well as pictures of what was described as a downed reconnaissance plane.

The video appeared to offer the first evidence that Iraq had seized British prisoners in the war, which Washington and London launched last Thursday in an effort to topple Iraqi President Saddam Hussein.

Iraqi state television on Sunday showed video of five US soldiers captured after an ambush near the city of Nassiriyah, as well as video of the bloodied corpses of up to eight US soldiers allegedly killed in the same encounter.

US officials denounced the footage, and said the questioning of the five captives on television violated the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners of war.

Iraqi television on Monday showed film of two pilots of a US Apache helicopter that was downed southwest of Baghdad, although it did not show them being questioned.

Iraq, for its part, has accused US-led forces of kidnapping local civilians and showing them off as captured POWs. US military officials said yesterday they had taken more than 4,000 Iraqi prisoners so far in the conflict.

The human rights group Society for Threatened Peoples said yesterday in statement, Iraqi Army has killed 62 of its own officers in the city of Kirkuk who refused to fight, as well as civilians accused of sabotage.

Among the 94 people executed last Sunday were 16 Iraqi civilians, 12 Kurds and four Turkmen, said the statement which cited two independent witnesses in the city.

Asked about the sources for the report, Society for Threatened Peoples director Tilman Zuelch declined to identify them due to concerns for their safety. “We have known these people for a long time — they are absolutely reliable,” said Zuelch in a telephone interview. The Goettingen, Germany-based Society for Threatened Peoples is an independent NGO in consultative status with the United Nations.