No 2 leader of al-Qaida in Iraq killed
(AP)
Updated: 2005-09-28 07:47

Iraqi and U.S. forces claimed a major blow against one of the country's deadliest insurgent groups Tuesday, saying they killed the No. 2 leader of al-Qaida in Iraq who masterminded a brutal escalation in suicide bombings that claimed nearly 700 lives in Baghdad since April.

Iraqi police officers examine the remains of a car following a car bomb attack in Baghdad, Iraq, Tuesday Sept. 27 2005. A car bomb expolded in Baghdad today targeting SUV's carrying security guards working with US companies. Four people were injured and nobody killed according to eye witnesses. [AP]

The attacks also wounded 1,500 in the capital, according to an Associated Press tally.

Despite the reported success, a suicide attacker blew himself up in a police recruitment center in the town of Baqouba, north of the capital, killing nine people. In Baghdad, gunmen killed four policemen. At least 66 people, including four U.S. forces, have been killed in attacks since Sunday.

But the week's death toll could have been far higher: U.S. Marines intercepted a suicide bomber who had succeeded in driving his explosives-packed vehicle into the capital's heavily fortified Green Zone and reached within a mile of the U.S. Embassy.

The discovery raised concerns about security in the zone, where U.S. and Iraqi government buildings and residences are located. A U.S. military spokesman said the driver of the car was arrested and the military later detonated the vehicle.

The driver was caught at a checkpoint on a road within the zone leading to the embassy, close to the home of Iraqi Vice President Ghazi al-Yawer, a security official said, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of the information.

In southern Iraq, police found the badly decomposed bodies of 22 Iraqi men who had been shot to death and dumped in a field, many of them bound and blindfolded, said Police Lt. Othman al-Lami of the Wasit provincial police. He said the victims appeared to have been killed more than a month ago but their identities were not known. The district — northeast of Kut, about 100 miles southeast of Baghdad — is mostly Shiite.

The al-Qaida in Iraq No. 2, Abdullah Abu Azzam, was killed in a gunbattle that broke out when he opened fire on troops raiding his hide out in a high-rise apartment building in southeast Baghdad before dawn Sunday, Lt. Col. Steve Boylan, a U.S. military spokesman, told AP.

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