Baghdad: Al Qaida's top two leaders in Iraq have been killed in a joint US-Iraqi military raid north of Baghdad, dealing Osama Bin Laden's global terror network a major blow, American forces said on Monday.
Abu Omar Al Baghdadi and Abu Ayoub Al Masri, who had direct links with Bin Laden, were killed early on Sunday in a shootout 10 kilometres southwest of Tikrit, the home city of executed dictator Saddam Hussain.
Prime Minister Nouri Al Maliki, holding pictures of both men before and after their deaths, said Al Qaida was now "bleeding... and severely weakened," and that a major threat to the country's security had been removed.
"Their leaders are falling," Al Maliki told state television. "Al Qaida has become too weak to represent a danger to Iraq, but we have to be more careful and aware to eliminate them completely."
He said Baghdadi and Al Masri, whose identities were confirmed after forensic tests, were killed in a raid on a safehouse as part of a major operation in which evidence was found that had foiled future attacks.
"During the operations computers were seized with emails and messages to the two biggest terrorists, Osama Bin Laden and Ayman Al Zawahiri," Al Maliki added.
Iraq's government has on several previous occasions announced the capture and killing of Al Baghdadi and his real influence in Al Qaida had in the past been called into question by US forces.
Al Maliki said that although Al Qaida had "tried to camouflage Abu Omar Al Baghdadi by presenting several people with this name," the man who had been killed on Sunday was not in doubt.
"This is genuine," Al Maliki said, shortly before a US military statement backed up the killings.
"The death of these terrorists is potentially the most significant blow to Al Qaida in Iraq (AQI) since the beginning of the insurgency," said General Ray Odierno, the top US commander in Iraq.
"The government of Iraq intelligence services and security forces supported by US intelligence and special operations forces have over the last several months continued to degrade AQI.
"There is still work to do but this is a significant step forward in ridding Iraq of terrorists," Odierno said.
American forces have always said Al Masri - a veteran Egyptian militant named Al Qaida chief in June 2006 following the death of his better-known Jordanian predecessor Abu Musab Al Zarqawi in a US air raid - was the real AQI leader.
The US statement notably referred to Al Masri before it mentioned Baghdadi.
"The joint security team identified both AQI members, and the terrorists were killed after engaging the security team," it said.
"[Al] Masri's assistant along with the son of [Al] Baghdadi, who were also involved in terrorist activities, were killed," the statement added.
Iraqi authorities said last April they had captured Baghdadi, identified as one of the top leaders of the local wing of Al Qaida blamed for a wave of violence across the nation.
The Islamic State of Iraq (ISI), the Al Qaida front in the country, however, denied the claim and said Al Baghdadi was "fine," SITE Intelligence Group said, quoting a statement released on Islamist forums on May 11, 2009.
In July 2007, a US military spokesman said Al Baghdadi was a fictional character designed to put an Iraqi face on a terror group led by foreigners and that the voice on his audiotapes was that of an actor.
The ISI is a self-styled umbrella organisation for Al Qaida-affiliated insurgent groups fighting US and Iraqi forces that has pledged loyalty to Bin Laden.
At the height of Iraq's sectarian violence in 2006 and 2007, Al Qaida and other Sunni militant groups killed thousands of civilians when they bombed markets and mosques crowded with Shiite civilians.
