This is Local London: The Iraqi orphan who lost both arms in a devastating missile attack on Baghdad is to be fitted with prosthetic arms in Wandsworth, England.

Ali Ismail Abbas, now 13, had to cope not only with amputation and severe burns, but also the death of his father, pregnant mother, brother and six other relatives in the April missile attack that destroyed his home.

Images of Ali shocked the world, and his chances of survival were almost written off by doctors as he lay in a hospital in the Saddam City slum quarter of Baghdad. Ali himself once told doctors: “If I cannot get a pair of hands, I will commit suicide.” But now the Limbless Association is to bring Ali, and another teenage Iraqi amputee, Ahmad Hanza, to the specialist prosthetics clinic in Roehampton for treatment.

Chief executive Diana Morgan said Ali now sounded “very, very cheerful, and happy to be coming to England”.