anyone suspicious about this?

U.S.: Insurgent figure killed in Iraq

BAGHDAD - U.S.-led forces killed a senior al-Qaida in Iraq operative believed responsible for the kidnappings of Westerners, including a Christian Science Monitor reporter and a slain peace worker from Virginia, a military spokesman said Thursday.

The U.S. Embassy, meanwhile, said a rocket attack on Iraq's Green Zone on Wednesday killed four foreign contractors _one from the Philippines, one from Nepal and two from India — who were working for a U.S. government contractor. It was the third straight day that extremists used rockets or mortars to hit the area where Iraq's parliament meets.

U.S. Maj. Gen. William Caldwell said the killing of Muharib Abdul-Latif al-Jubouri, described as al-Qaida's information minister, had apparently led to confused reports that al-Qaida's top leader or the head of an umbrella group of Sunni insurgents had been killed.

Caldwell said the military had conducted numerous operations against al-Qaida in Iraq in the last six days but does not have the bodies of Abu Omar al-Baghdadi and Abu Ayyub al-Masri and did not know "of anybody that does."

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