When asked whether US-led forces controlled the airport, Major Morris Goins, operations officer for the 1st Brigade of the 3rd Infantry Division said: "We own part of it".

More than 1,000 US troops were active in and around the airport, he added, speaking to the correspondent inside the airport compound.

US military sources said positions of Saddam Hussein's crack Republican Guard troops inside the airport had been bombed on Thursday evening.

A large breach had been broken in the airport wall through which heavy military equipment could move in, the correspondent said.

Witnesses had earlier reported that the airport had come under heavy artillery fire, leaving dozens killed and injured.

The correspondent said several loud explosions could be heard but that at midnight (2100 GMT) fighting appeared to have almost stopped.

When Goins was asked if US troops had been met with Iraqi resistance in their bid to seize the airport, he answered: "Not much".

As US troops made their push towards the strategic airport Thursday, they came under rocket-propelled grenade and mortar attacks, said a correspondent travelling with them.

WAR.WIRE