KUWAIT (AP) - Two Kuwaiti gunmen in a pickup truck fired on U.S. forces during war games today on an uninhabited island in the Persian Gulf, killing one marine and wounding another in what the Kuwaiti government called a "terrorist act." The assailants were killed by American troops. 
The Pentagon said the assailants pulled up to a group of marines conducting a live-fire exercise on Failaka Island off Kuwait's coast and attacked with small-arms fire. They then drove to another site, stopped and opened fire again before being killed by marines who returned fire, the Pentagon said. 

The marines later found three AK-47s and ammunition inside the vehicle, according to a statement released in Washington by the Bahrain-based U.S. 5th Fleet. It said the injured marine was hit in the arm. 

In a brief statement, the Kuwaiti Interior Ministry condemned the attack and identified the assailants as Anas al-Kandari, born in 1981, and Jassem al-Hajiri, born in 1976. It said both were Kuwaiti civilians. 

An Interior Ministry official, speaking on condition of anonymity, described the two men as fundamentalist Muslims. More than 30 of their friends and relatives were detained for questioning, he said. 

"The ministry announces that this is a terrorist act," the Interior Ministry said in a statement. "It will not allow anyone to undermine the country's security." 

Navy Lt.-Cmdr. Nick Balice, a spokesman for the U.S. Central Command in Florida, said the marines left the island shortly after the attack. He said he didn't know if the exercise would resume. 

Failaka Island, about 20 kilometres east of Kuwait City, was abandoned by its inhabitants when Iraq invaded Kuwait in 1990, and Iraqi forces heavily mined it during their occupation. 

After a U.S.-led coalition liberated Kuwait in the 1991 Gulf War, the government compensated islanders for their property and resettled them on the mainland. The island has since been cleared of mines and many Kuwaitis fish there on weekends. Some former residents visit occasionally. 

The shooting attack was unprecedented in Kuwait, a Washington ally since the Gulf War. More than a decade later, most Kuwaitis remain supportive of the close relationship. 

Pentagon spokeswoman Victoria Clarke said the two marines were taken to the Armed Forces Hospital in Kuwait City, where one of them died of his wounds. Their names were withheld until relatives were contacted. 

Lt.-Col. Dave Lapan, another Pentagon spokesman, said the marines were involved in urban assault training when they came under fire. 

The military exercise, dubbed Eager Mace 2002, involves Kuwaitis at some stages. However, Lapan said the attack happened during an exercise that only involved U.S. forces. 

The war games started Oct. 1, after the amphibious transport ships USS Denver and USS Mount Vernon arrived in Kuwaiti waters and began unloading 1,000 marines and their equipment. The men and women are from the 11th Marine Expeditionary Unit based in Camp Pendleton, Calif. The vessels' 900 sailors were also taking part in the manoeuvres. 

The U.S. military has carried out exercises in Kuwait since the Gulf War as part of a defence agreement the small oil-rich state signed with Washington. The Pentagon has said the current war games were routine and not related to any possible war to oust Iraqi President Saddam Hussein. 

Kuwait opposes any unilateral action against Iraq and fears retaliation with non-conventional weapons if the United States attacks Baghdad. However, it has said the United States could use its land for an attack if the war is sanctioned by the United Nations. 

Muslim fundamentalists are politically strong in Kuwait. They want Saddam removed from power, but many believe President George W. Bush's real motives for waging war would be to revive the foundering U.S. economy and to weaken Arabs out of support for Israel. 

Scores of Kuwaitis have fought alongside Muslims in Afghanistan, Chechnya and Bosnia, but they have not attacked Americans in Kuwait - even at the height of the U.S. war that toppled Afghanistan's Taliban regime. The Taliban harboured Osama bin Laden's Al Qaeda organization, which is blamed for last year's Sept. 11 attacks on the United States. 

When a Canadian man was shot and killed while walking in the street just after the war in Afghanistan started, it was thought to be in retaliation against foreigners. A Kuwaiti religious extremist was apprehended and later freed. 

Eventually, a group of Filipinos, including the victim's wife, was arrested and tried for murdering the man for his life insurance. One Filipino was convicted and sentenced to life in prison. 

"I just hope it is not Islamists," former oil minister and legislator Ali al-Baghli said of Tuesday's attack. "It would be very inhospitable." 

The U.S. army prepositions weapons at Camp Doha, a base along the Gulf coast about 20 kilometres west of Kuwait City. The U.S. air force uses two Kuwaiti bases to patrol the southern no-fly zone over Iraq, which was set up after the war to protect Iraqi Shiites who rose up against Saddam.