A MILITANT group holding two Bulgarian truck drivers hostage in Iraq said last night it had executed one of them and planned to kill the other in 24 hours.

AFGHANISTAN'S government yesterday welcomed a decision by the United States to prosecute a CIA contractor over the brutal killing of a prisoner in a northeastern jail.

US army engineers have sealed the underground bunker where former Iraqi dictator Saddam Hussein was captured to prevent it becoming a tourist attraction, a military spokesman said today.

American soldiers shot dead seven members of an armed gang trying to steal oil from a pipeline in central Iraq last night.

Iraq today claimed to have shot down two Apache helicopters and said it was holding the two Allied pilots prisoner.

US military police officers marched the “prisoners” in front of a mock detention centre, shouting at them in English and Arabic, ordering them to their knees to be searched before they get food, water and a place to sleep.

A US Air Force sergeant has been killed in an accident in the Arabian Peninsula, becoming the first American death in Operation Enduring Freedom.