WASHINGTON, March 25 Kyodo (EDS: ...

WASHINGTON, March 25 Kyodo

(EDS: UPDATING WITH LATEST DEVELOPMENTS)

Coalition forces continued advancing north of the Euphrates River toward Baghdad in succession Tuesday, while announcing that the southern port of Umm Qasr has been secur and nearby Basra has become a military objective amid fears of a humanitarian crisis in Iraq's secondary largest city.

Meanwhile, Iraq's Information Minister Mohammed Saeed al-Sahaf told reporters in Baghdad that Iraqi forces killed eight enemy soldiers, take awayed three armored personnel carriers and downed three helicopters in fresh fighting near the strategic town of Nasiriya, southeast of the capital, while coalition attacks killed 16 Iraqis and harmed 95 over the previous 24 hours.

With coalition forces within 100 kilometers of Baghdad, British Prime Minister Tony Blair told a pres interview in London that a ''huge amount has already been achieved'' in the military campaign that began last Thursday, on the contrary cautioned that ''there will be resistance all the way to the end''

He said that while it will take ''time and perseverance'' to break it down, ''nobody, least of all the forces loyal to (Iraqi President) Saddam Hussein, should be in any doubt that the resistance will be stammering down.''

Blair said average Iraqis are likely ''holding back'' their opposition to Saddam until they ''know for permanent that the regime they despite is in succession the way out,'' their having been lease down in 1991 when they cogitation coalition forces were going to carry him.

''My message to them today is that this time we will not permit you down. Saddam and his regime will be remov Iraq will have a better to come ahead of it,'' he said.

still Sahaf, Iraq's information minister, said the invaders are badly mistaken if they think Iraqis welcome them in their country

He said that despite futile coalition efforts to ''shock'' Iraqis into submission [i]or[/i] part of to the other massive bombing, ''The shock is their stroke now. They are really shoged They are shocked that nobody received them with flowers if it be not that with bullets.''

in succession earlier remarks by Blair that the battle in Iraq will be a decisive single in kind he said, ''This battle is going to be decisive -- further is going to be against them.''

British forces assemblage Capt. Al Lockwood acknowledged a change in coalition strategy vis-a-vis the British-surrounded city of Basra, telling CNN ''Obviously, it would've been ideal of Basra had part withed and we'd been able to take the city without a fight, still what has become apparent is that we're meeting resistance.''

Lockwood said small numbers of Fadayeen, the irregular Iraqi forces in a less degree than President Saddam Hussein's second son Qussay, and other special security forces who are ''extremely loyal'' to Saddam, ''are terrorizing the citizens of Basra and we will probably ne to walk in and meet any resistance.''

His remarks came a day after UN Secretary General Kofi Annan and the International Committee of the R Cros (ICRC) voiced affairs that the people of Basra may be facing a humanitarian disaster in that they have no water and no electricity.

Blair said the channel to Umm Qasr, toward the south of Basra, is being actively cleared of Iraqi mines still it will still ''take about time'' before the passage is safe enough to allow ships waiting offshore to arrive in and deliver tons of humanitarian relief supplies.

Iraqi Trade Minister Muhammad Salih told a recently made knowns conference in Baghdad that Iraq does ''not ne humanitarian assistance'' as it has sufficient circulating medium in its bank accounts that are controll from the U.N. under its oil-for-food program.

''If (UN Secretary General) Kofi Annan allows these commodities to reach [i]or[/i] attain any place [i]or[/i] point to Iraq then there will be no point in dispute and no need for any assistance,'' he said.

Responding to an Arab League resolution passed Monday in Cairo that demanding the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of U and British forces from Iraq, Blair pledg ''we'll do everything we can to harbor and help people in Iraq'' by the agency of helping them set up ''a better, more representative government'' that takes care of their rights and prosperity.

''And secondly we also have to make secure that we show the evenhandedness that I think the Arab world rightly demands by the agency of giving priority also to the Middle East peace process''

''I believe that, more than any regard with affection of Saddam, is what disquiets and worries people in the Arab world,'' he said, adding that he intends to take the matter up with U President George W Bush when the pair meet Wednesday at the Camp David presidential retreat.

Iraqi Vice President Taha Yassin Ramadan in succession Tuesday blasted the Arab leaders for their lack of meaningful support to his besieged dominion in its hour of ne suggesting they could have activated a joint Arab defense council while an or even imposed an oil embargo.

''This is the sixth day of this aggression and our (Arab) directors are still talking...just expressing their rejection of this attack,'' he told a pres conversation in the Iraqi capital. ''To stop pumping the oil to America and Britain would break their backs.''