A British battalion of 600 infantry have been told to make ready for deployment to Iraq, the Conservatives claimed today.

The soldiers, understood to be from the 2nd Battalion Princess of Wales’s Royal Regiment, were told of the move “some time ago”, according to the Tories.

Shadow defence secretary Nicholas Soames said the battalion was expected to be based in the southern Iraqi city of Basra.

“I know that an infantry regiment has been stood up to go to Iraq.” he said. “They are in the UK now. It is a battalion, about 600.”

A spokesman for Mr Soames added: “He has it on good authority. It is pretty bad because the Secretary of State for Defence ought to have come to Parliament to explain.”

But the Ministry of Defence insisted there had been no move to deploy more British troops.

An MoD spokesman said: “No decision has been made to deploy the 2nd battalion of the Princess of Wales’s Regiment to Iraq.”

The battalion was put on “very high readiness reserve” as of November 1, which means they can be deployed at 10 days’ notice.

The official added: “Being at very high readiness reserve does not mean that any decision has been taken for such a deployment to take place.”

The news of the rumoured deployment came as the latest Black Watch soldier to be killed in Iraq was named as Private Pita Tukutukuwaqa of the 1st Battalion.

The 27-year-old married soldier died yesterday when his Warrior armoured vehicle was hit by a roadside bomb north of their Camp Dogwood base, south of Baghdad.

Two other soldiers from the Scots battle group were injured in the blast.

They were airlifted by a US helicopter to a military hospital in the Iraqi capital but their injuries were not serious, the MoD said.

Their vehicle swerved off the road when its wheels on one side were destroyed in the attack, which happened at 6.30pm local time yesterday.

The powerful blast was apparently detonated by insurgents using a command wire hiding close by as a routine road convoy passed.

Pte Tukutukuwaqa came from Fiji and was described by his colleagues as a trained sniper and outstanding sportsman.

A spokesman for the Black Watch said: “He will be dearly missed by his regiment and his friends.

“The Black Watch Battle Group is developing its tactics to counter this sort of attack and has been supported by specialist equipment to assist these tactics.”

The latest death follows those of Black Watch soldiers Private Paul Lowe, Sergeant Stuart Gray and Private Scott McArdle, all from Fife, in a suicide bomb attack in the notorious “triangle of death” last Thursday.

The MoD confirmed the bodies of the three men will be flown to Brize Norton in Oxfordshire tomorrow, where their homecoming will be held in private.

Followers of terrorist Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, responsible for beheading kidnapped Briton Ken Bigley, claimed responsibility for the attack.

Two of the regiment’s bomb disposal experts were also seriously injured in a suicide car bomb attack on Sunday.

Prime Minister Tony Blair’s official spokesman refused to be drawn on reports that the Black Watch is considering changing its tactics in light of the attacks.

He added: “As in any deployment, they are obviously reviewing the way they are operating on a day-to-day basis.

“That’s entirely sensible, and it’s equally entirely sensible that we leave that to them and not get involved – and we won’t.”

Mr Soames said he expected the Black Watch would be reviewing their tactics and predicted they may be reinforced in the coming days by the redeployment of Challenger II tanks from Basra.

Liberal Democrat defence spokesman Paul Keetch called on Defence Secretary Geoff Hoon to make an urgent statement to the Commons about the continuing role of British troops in Iraq, ahead of Mr Blair’s trip to see US President George Bush in Washington later this week.

The 850-strong Black Watch regiment was controversially deployed to Camp Dogwood, around 15 miles south of Baghdad, to relieve US forces preparing for the Fallujah assault.

Overnight, US troops advanced slowly on Fallujah from two sides – the north-eastern Askari neighbourhood and the north-western Jolan neighbourhood, a warren of alleyways where Sunni militants have dug in.

Just to the north of Jolan, Iraqi troops deployed with US forces took over a railway station, a strategic target in northern Fallujah, turning it into an ad hoc base after they helped Marines drive off fighters.

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