BAGHDAD, Iraq (AP):
THE MOST-FEARED terrorist in Iraq - Abu Musab al-Zarqawi - was killed in a massive U.S. air strike north of Baghdad after an intense two-week hunt that U.S. officials said yesterday first led to the insurgent leader's spiritual adviser and then to him.
Within hours, Iraq's prime minister named three key security ministers - military and political breakthroughs in rapid succession that marked the biggest potential turnaround in Iraq in months.
The body of Al-Zarqawi, who had pledged fealty to al-Qaida leader Osama bin Laden, was identified by fingerprints, tattoos and known scars, according to White House spokesman Tony Snow.
SLAUGHTERING SHEIK
The Jordanian-born al-Zarqawi was known for his extraordinary brutality as the leader of the largely Sunni Muslim insurgency in Iraq, earning him the title of the 'slaughtering sheik' among his followers. He wielded the huge knives used in beheading American hostages Nicholas Berg and Eugene Armstrong.
His insurgent followers were responsible for the vast majority of U.S. military deaths and those of thousands of Iraqis, mainly in a campaign of roadside bombings and suicide attacks.
And within hours of al-Zarqawi's death, a string of bomb attacks hit Baghdad, killing nearly 40 people yesterday
Gunmen also killed a total of seven people around Iraq, including the brother of Mosul governor Durad Kashmola.
To short-circuit doubt that al-Zarqawi had been killed, U.S. military spokesman Maj. Gen. William Caldwell showed reporters a picture of the dead terror boss.
He also screened a videotape of the air assault taken by one of the F-16 fighter jets that dropped the two 500-pound bombs, obliterating the terrorist leader's safehouse eight kilometres (five miles) west of the insurgent stronghold of Baqouba.
"We had absolutely no doubt whatsoever that Zarqawi was in the house," Caldwell said, adding that five other people, including a woman and a child, were killed with al-Zarqawi and Abu Abdul-Rahman al-Iraqi, the terrorist's spiritual consultant.
