HUNDREDS of mourners paid their final respects yesterday to a North-East military policeman who was murdered while on a tour of duty in Iraq.

Company Sergeant Major Colin Wall, 34, was laid to rest with full military honours after a funeral in the Weardale village of Stanhope, County Durham.

About 250 family, friends and comrades packed the 12th Century St Thomas's church, where Warrant Officer Wall had been christened.

Villagers also lined the street outside the church to say their goodbyes to the Crawleyside-born soldier.

His wife, Trish, held their ten-month old son Alexander close as she was comforted by WO Wall's parents, Barry, 62, and Joan, 64, of Crook, County Durham.

The Red Cap's children from his first marriage to Isabella, Robert, ten and Lauren, 12, also attended the service.

Sergeant Major Jeremy Thomson, of the 3rd Regiment Royal Military Police paid tribute to his colleague, who lived in Middleton One Row, near Darlington.

Delivering the eulogy, he said the family man was "the epitome of a professional soldier".

He said: "It is quite impossible to convey all that there is to say about Colin in such a limited time.

"Colin was destined to join the Army. No matter how painful the emotion, we must accept that Colin is no longer with us, but he continues to lighten our lives even now."

The Vicar of St Thomas's, Reverend Philip Greenhalgh, and Catterick Garrison padre Andrew Duff led the service.

He said: "Colin believed in what he was doing.

"His example of courage and discipline, inspiring the men and women under his command and who are still based in Iraq, underpins the belief that what they are doing will make our world a safer place."

At the end of the service, the soldier's coffin was carried out of the church followed by mourners, including dozens of uniformed Royal Military Police officers. Outside, WO Wall was given a six-gun salute.

Bugler Corporal Glen Rhodes played The Last Post and there was a minute's silence before the coffin was taken away for a cremation service at Durham Crematorium in Durham City.

WO Wall is the first soldier from Tony Blair's Sedgefield constituency to be killed in Iraq. He died along with Major Matthew Titchener and Corporal Dewi Pritchard last month when their vehicle was ambushed in Basra.