Captured Iraqi not al-Baghdadi

“Interrogations and investigations are still under way to get more information,” he said.

 

Al-Moussawi had previously said that al-Baghdadi had been captured in a raid in Abu Ghraib on the outskirts of Baghdad, a report later verified by a senior adviser to Nuri al-Maliki, the Iraqi prime minister.

 

“One of the terrorists who was arrested with him confessed that the one in our hands is al-Baghdadi,” al-Moussawi said on Iraqiya state television on Friday.

 

Your Views

“It’s my belief that peace among Muslim sects will encourage also peace between Islam and other cultures” Adolfo Talpalar, Stockholm, Sweden   Send us your views

Al-Baghdadi, also known as Abu Abdullah Rashid al-Baghdadi, has been identified in statements posted on websites as the self-styled head of the Islamic State of Iraq, proclaimed last year after the death of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaeda in Iraq.

 

The Islamic State of Iraq, said to be linked to al-Qaeda and armed Sunni groups, has claimed responsibility for a string of major attacks.

 

US and Iraqi forces have increasingly focused on al-Baghdadi’s group in their attempts to end sectarian vioence in Iraq.

 

Al-Baghdadi is also said to have headed the Mujahidin Shura Council, an alliance of al-Qaeda and other hardline groups. Very little is known about al-Baghdadi and his capture would be hard for officials to verify.