Claims Zarqawi beaten to death
2006-06-11 15:47
Washington - The leader of coalition forces in Iraq on Sunday dismissed as "ludicrous" reports that al-Qaeda operative Abu Musab al-Zarqawi may have been beaten to death by US forces following the air strike on his safe house.
"That's baloney," said US General George Casey, speaking to the Fox News Sunday television programme.
"We've already gone back and looked at it.
"Our soldiers who came on the scene found him being put in an ambulance by Iraqi police, they took him off, rendered first aid, and he expired," Casey said.
"He died while American soldiers were attempting to save his life. So the idea that there were people there beating him is just ludicrous."
Two British newspapers, the Observer and the Sunday Times, cited apparent eye-witnesses to the immediate aftermath of the attack on Wednesday near the city of Baquba, northeast of Baghdad, who claimed that the badly-injured Zarqawi was beaten to death.
- AFP