Special report:
Tension escalates in
Iraq
Al-Qaida's Iraq chief
Zarqawi killed
BEIJING, Sept.
25 (Xinhuanet) -- British troops killed a senior al Qaeda figure in a predawn
raid in southern Iraq on Monday, officials said.
Omar Faruq, who escaped from a high security
American prison in Afghanistan in 2005, was shot dead while resisting arrest
during the raid by about 200 British troops in Iraq's second biggest city,
Basra, British military spokesman Major Charlie Burbridge said.
"The individual had been tracked across Iraq and was
in hiding in Basra," Burbridge said, calling him a "very, very significant man".
"Two companies (about 200 troops) launched the
operation in the early hours of this morning. The troops returned to base
without any multinational force casualties."
Faruq was described by Washington as the most senior
al Qaeda figure in Southeast Asia, a key link between Osama bin Laden's
followers and Indonesia's Jemaah Islamiah militants.
He was caught in Indonesia in 2002 and held at a
high-security detention center at Bagram airbase north of the Afghan capital
Kabul until his escape last year.
U.S. did not reveal that Faruq had escaped until last
November, when he was demanded as a witness at the trial of a U.S. army sergeant
accused of abusing prisoners in Bagram.
U.S. officials said they would await results of
forensic tests before confirming the death of Faruq. Enditem
(Agencies)
