Two more Zarqawi aides nabbed

AFP:

Iraqi and US troops have arrested two top aides of Al-Qaeda's Iraq frontman, Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, and are hot on the heels of militants loyal to him in northwestern Iraq, commanders said, a day after the country's most wanted man was reported wounded.

Described as "one of the most wanted people" in northern Iraq, Mullah Kamel al-Assawadi was detained after he tried to bribe his way past an Iraqi checkpoint, the US military said Wednesday.

One of Zarqawi's regional secretaries was also detained in the restive provincial capital of Baquba, north of Baghdad, a statement said.

"Assawadi was questioned by an Iraqi soldier at a checkpoint close to Balad," an insurgent stronghold near Baquba, the military said without giving a date for his arrest.

Described as one of Zarqawi's top lieutenants, Assawadi had on him various identity papers as well as dollars with which he tried to buy the soldier's silence.

"He tried to hide his identity but several detainees recognised him and he is currently held at a Multi-National Forces detention centre where he is being questioned," the statement added.

Assawadi allegedly financed and provided military training to an insurgent cell and helped prepare car bombs.

"He was linked to numerous Wahhabis (Saudi-inspired Sunni militants) operating north of Baghdad," said the statement, adding that Assawadi was based in the Sunni insurgent bastion of Samarra, a city north of Baghdad which was retaken from rebels in a massive US-backed assault last autumn.


The Shia tend to identify the Zarqawi terrorist as Wahhabis, since many of them come from Saudia Arabia and follow the al Qaeda/Wahhabi philophy of biggotry toward Shia among others of "the other." The more leadership figures that are captured or killed, the sooner the enemy will be defeated. This is not a bottom up insurgency.

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