SHAKING his fist at the British armoured column speeding past him, Abdiraza Jeri and his friends spat out a volley of insults as others in the weary trail of refugees threw stones at the Desert Rats.

The 42-year-old haulage contractor had been walking for three hours to escape the siege of Basra. He was intending to return with his fleet of lorries filled with water so that some of the city’s 1.4 million parched residents had something to drink. But he and thousands more tramping along this main road could not understand yesterday why such a formidable array of British tanks was parked on the edge of his city while gangs of Saddam loyalists slowly strangled Basra. British soldiers sitting on their Warrior vehicle looked stunned when a couple of packets of sweets that they had thrown to children were hurled back by their fathers.

Clenching his fists in frustration, Mr Jeri apologised for his outburst. “I have no love for Saddam, but tell me how are we better off today when there is no power, nor water. There are dead bodies lying in our streets and my children are scared to go to bed because of the shelling.”

A crush of several thousand people was trying to flee, many faint with heat and dehydration, but they were hemmed in by British sentries who were allowing them through in single file. The troops have no translators to explain that they are doing this to ensure that gunmen are not infiltrating the refugees. Yet neither has any provision been made at these roadblocks to ease the misery of those caught up in this siege.

For five days the numbers leaving have been growing and still these troops had no water tankers waiting for the women and children who walk miles in wilting heat before family and friends are allowed to pick them up in their vehicles. There are no doctors, nor food, and yesterday a team of Red Cross volunteers sat inside their air-conditioned four-wheel-drive vehicle.

Flanked by a half-dozen of his drivers, Mr Jeri told how they had had to leave their families cowering in basements because intermittent mortar and artillery fire made it too dangerous to walk this road. The coalition had promised not to shell a civilian centre such as Basra. Yesterday they were doing just that. As a mortar shell exploded just beyond the main road, sending up a shower of dirt and sand, many in the crowd flinched and dropped to their knees.

Mr Jeri pointed to a modern, mustard-coloured building at the edge of an industrial estate on the outskirts of Basra and said: “This is where Saddam’s militia are shooting.”

The distance could be no more than three quarters of a mile from where two Warriors sat monitoring this human traffic jam. “We know the risks if the Army go in,” he added. “Some people will die, but what is the alternative — sit here forever?” Snatch squads of Irish Guards are reported to have dashed to part of the city to grab a handful of Baath party grandees, and shot up a statue of Saddam while they were there. But if the flow of people out of Basra is to be stemmed, tactics will have to change. One girl who could have been no more than eight burst into tears as she came within 10ft of three British soldiers, rifles pointing at the approaching crowd. Her father stopped, put down his heavy bundle of clothes and scooped her up.

A week ago everyone here waved at any allied soldier they passed. Not any more. Twenty miles away, Ministry of Defence spin-doctors had invited TV crews to show them laying a water pipeline to Umm Qasr. No one in Basra knew that was going on: they have no power for television.

Those leaving the city felt abandoned. Hassan al-Jamoudi said: “There will be no people’s uprising because we are scared the British and Americans will not come to help us. You have shown no sign of wanting to fight so far.”

Times Recommends

• Rio Tinto four held as China prepares case
• Diplomats must keep heads down and trousers up
• When in Rome should one make like Berlusconi?