Reuters: British troops in Iraq kill bin Laden lieutenant

[sabra]

http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GRA549745.htm

British troops in Iraq kill bin Laden lieutenant


BAGHDAD, Sept 25 (Reuters) - British troops in Iraq said on Monday they had killed one of al Qaeda leader Osama bin Laden's top global lieutenants, who escaped from a U.S. prison in Afghanistan last year.

Omar Faruq was shot dead while resisting arrest on Monday during a pre-dawn raid by about 200 British troops in Iraq's second biggest city, Basra, British military spokesman Major Charlie Burbridge said.

U.S. leaders have described Faruq as the top al Qaeda operative in southeast Asia. He was caught in Indonesia in 2002 and held at a high-security detention centre at Bagram airbase north of the Afghan capital Kabul until his escape last year.

"The individual had been tracked across Iraq and was in hiding in Basra," Burbridge said, calling him a "very, very significant man".