The US military said today it saw no need for the Iraqi Red Crescent to deliver aid to people inside Falluja and said it did not think any Iraqi civilians were trapped inside the city.
"There is no need to bring (Red Crescent) supplies in because we have supplies of our own for the people," said US Marine Colonel Mike Shupp.
"Now that the bridge (into Falluja) is open I will bring out casualties and all aid work can be done here (at Falluja's hospital)."
He said he had not heard of any Iraqi civilians being trapped inside the city and did not think that was the case.
The Iraqi Red Crescent believes at least 150 families are trapped inside Falluja and that many of those people are in desperate need of food, blankets, water and medicine.
Some residents still inside the city, contacted by Reuters today, said their children were suffering from diarrhoea and had not eaten for several days.
Asked what he intended to do about families and other non-combatants trapped inside the city, Shupp said: "I don't think that is the case. I haven't heard that myself and the Iraqi soldiers didn't tell me about that. We want to help them as much as we can. We are on the radio broadcast telling them how to come out and how to come up to coalition forces."
The Red Crescent has sent a convoy of seven aid trucks and ambulances to Falluja, but it has been stopped at the city's main hospital, on the west bank of the Euphrates river, away from the city proper.
There is almost no one at the hospital for doctors to treat because most residents still in the city were too scared to leave their homes during the fighting. The Red Crescent has said the only effective way it can help them is to go into the city.
Falluja's normal population is about 300,000 and about half are thought to have fled before the main US-led assault on insurgents in the city began last Monday.