[spookes]

FIRST LIEUTENANT Ehren Watada joined the US Army three years ago to fight for his country. Instead, he stood before a packed room of reporters and peace activists to say he cannot fight in Iraq and will refuse to join his brigade when it is deployed there this month.

"I best serve my soldiers by speaking out. I'm prepared to face the punishment," said Lieutenant Watada, who maintains that fighting in the war in Iraq will make him a "party to war crimes".

His supporters say he is the first commissioned officer to publicly refuse to serve in Iraq. His refusal will almost certainly lead to criminal charges and land him in jail.

"The wholesale slaughter and mistreatment of the Iraqi people is not only a terrible moral injustice but a contradiction of the army's own law of land warfare. My participation would make me party to war crimes," he said.

The army would not let him resign, and Lieutenant Watada said he did not want to apply for conscientious objector status. But the Pentagon said Lieutenant Watada, who turned 28 yesterday, was one of several officers and enlisted personnel who applied for conscientious objector status.

Lieutenant Watada had been scheduled to go to Iraq for his first tour this month. He joined the US Army in 2003, and had served in Korea. He said his moral and legal obligations were to the US constitution "not those who would issue unlawful orders".