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US choppers collide in Baghdad

Two US helicopters collided while landing at a base in Baghdad, killing one Iraqi soldier and wounding four people, including two US soldiers, the military said. It was the second helicopter crash in two weeks.

The US military said hostile fire did not appear to be the cause.

Also on Saturday, the military said it killed an al-Qaeda in Iraq leader suspected of masterminding one of the deadliest attacks in Baghdad, several other recent bombings and the 2006 videotaped killing of a Russian official.

The two UH-60 Black Hawks crashed shortly before 9pm in a northern section of the capital known as Azamiyah, the military said. The wounded included two US troops and two other Iraqis, but the total number of people on board was not yet known, a statement said.

“The situation is under control. Emergency services are on the scene,” military spokesman Lieutenant Patrick Evans said.

An investigation into the crash was under way.

Two Iraqi police officials, speaking on condition of anonymity because they weren’t authorized to release the information, said the crash occurred during clashes between gunmen and US-backed Iraqi forces in northern Baghdad.

Evans denied the reports, saying: “We have absolutely no reports of any clashes taking place nearby.”

The al-Qaeda in Iraq leader was killed on Friday elsewhere in northern Baghdad. US troops also killed the man’s wife in a firefight as they tried to capture him, the military said.

Mahir Ahmad Mahmud al-Zubaydi, also known as Abu Assad or Abu Rami, was accused of directing an insurgent cell believed to be responsible for nearly simultaneous car bomb and suicide attacks on Thursday, the statement said.

Iraqi police and hospital officials have said some 24 people were killed in Thursday’s attacks targeting two Shiite mosques in Baghdad.

Those attacks and others that struck during Ramadan have raised fears that al-Qaeda in Iraq is trying to provoke Sunni-Shiite reprisal killings as US-led forces begin to draw down.

Al-Zubaydi was among the most senior insurgents killed by US forces as they seek to shore up security gains that have driven the level of violence to its lowest point in more than four years.

General Ray Odierno, the top US commander in Iraq, said Shiites were “showing very much restraint” and authorities “haven’t seen any signs” that they plan to retaliate.

“I think we’ve made some good inroads inside of the network that was doing this,” he told reporters after a ceremony in Diwaniyah marking the departure of Polish troops from Iraq. “I feel confident that we will continue to go after them and make it very difficult for them to continue.”

Al-Zubaydi’s death will be a major blow to al-Qaeda in Iraq even as the group’s recruiting efforts have been “severely curbed” by a decision by many Sunnis to join forces with the US in the fight against it, military spokesman Rear Admiral Patrick Driscoll said.

The military also blamed al-Zubaydi for several car bombings and mortar attacks in Baghdad’s main Shiite district of Sadr City in 2006 and last year, including a series of blasts that killed more than 200 people on Nov. 23, 2006 — one of the deadliest attacks to strike the Iraqi capital.

Al-Zubaydi was also believed to have planned and participated in abductions and videotaped executions, including one in which he was seen shooting one of four kidnapped Russians, the statement said.

The Russian embassy workers were abducted in June 2006 after an attack on their car in Baghdad’s Mansour neighborhood.
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