Ali Salim, 14, was shot on Saturday at close range near a school used to house British soldiers in a suburb of the southern Iraqi city of Basra.

A Ministry of Defence spokeswoman in London said: "During a routine patrol of the 7th Armoured Brigade, there was an incident when one of several youths was involved in a struggle to take a weapon from a soldier and a shot was discharged injuring one of them."

However, it was unclear whether the boy had been playing a game which went wrong or making a serious attempt to obtain the soldier's weapon.

"The youth later died in hospital. A Royal Military Police investigation is underway to establish the facts," the defence ministry spokeswoman added.

A doctor at Basra's teaching hospital who treated the boy earlier told the BBC he had suffered a single bullet wound to the abdomen fired from very close range.

SPACE.WIRE