A DEWSBURY soldier has been shot in Iraq.

Sgt Glen Cooper, 35, was wounded after trouble erupted in a village 120 miles north of Basra.

He was one of four soldiers injured in the firefight in the village of Qalah Salih on Friday.

All four escaped serious injury, but were taken to Shaibah military hospital near Basra.

Sgt Cooper, who belongs to the 2nd Battalion, Parachute Regiment, and two comrades were first on the scene when hundreds of angry villagers mobbed a British patrol.

He said: "I was crouching down when I felt this sharp pain and I was thrown to the ground.

"There seemed to be hundreds of Iraqis and we were taking a lot of incoming fire.

"But we managed to make it to a nearby building, where I had a field dressing put on the wound."

The trouble broke out after the patrol tried to arrest an Iraqi who had shot at them.

The mob launched a rocket-propelled grenade, which blew up a Land Rover.

Gunmen then fired at the soldiers, forcing them to take cover in a building until reinforcements came.

A rapid reaction force helicopter arrived, with four Warrior armoured personnel carriers and about 50 soldiers.

They eventually restored order.

It is not known if there were any Iraqi casualties.