Al Qaeda's leader in Iraq Abu Musab al-Zarqawi is seen in an undated photo.

    BEIJING, Nov. 22 -- US officials doubted the notion that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the most wanted man in the Middle East, may have been killed in a raid in Iraq as tests were underway to determine if the leader of al Qaeda was among those killed.

    Eight insurgents and four Iraqi policemen died in the raid by US and Iraqi forces, including three insurgents who blew themselves up to avoid capture, officials said.

    Iraq's foreign minister said yesterday that urgent DNA tests were being carried out on the bodies of several people who died when US and Iraqi forces stormed a house in the northern city of Mosul, to determine if al-Zarqawi was among them.

    The US administration, which had offered a $25m reward for al-Zarqawi, played down the reports.

    The U.S. ambassador to Iraq said he doubted that the dead included al-Zarqawi.

    "I don't believe that we got him. Of course, his days are numbered, we are after him, we are getting ever closer," Zalmay Khalilzad told reporters.

    A US government official, who spoke in Washington on condition of anonymity, confirmed that DNA from the eight insurgents who died in the Saturday raid in Mosul had been taken for testing. Enditem

(Agencies)