A former US soldier received five consecutive life sentences for his role in the rape and murder of an Iraqi teenager and the murder of three of her family members.

A US soldier convicted of rape and murder in an attack on an Iraqi teenager and her family has been sentenced to 110 years in prison.

A military jury has found a soldier guilty of murder following the rape and death of a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and her family.

A US soldier was sentenced today to 18 years in prison after he pleaded guilty to murdering three detainees during a raid on a suspected al-Qaida compound in Iraq last year.

Suspected insurgents set off a car bomb to stop a minibus carrying Shiite government employees in Baghdad, then shot and killed 15 of them, the Iraqi government said.

A soldier was sentenced to 90 years in prison with the possibility of parole in 20 years for conspiring to rape a 14-year-old Iraqi girl and kill her and her family.

Defence attorneys requested a gag order today that applies even to US President George Bush and other high-ranking federal officials in the case of a former Army private accused over the rape and killing of a young Iraqi.

US federal prosecutors yesterday charged a veteran of the Iraq war with murder and rape following an investigation into the killing of an Iraqi woman and members of her family.

A senior Iraqi military official today said the bodies of two missing US soldiers had been discovered on a street near the town where they went missing.

The US military today said it had intensified its search for two missing soldiers, with more than 8,000 Iraqi and US troops combing the volatile area south of Baghdad where the men were attacked.

ROCK legend Jimi Hendrix pretended he was gay to get out of the US Army, a new biography reveals.

Rock legend Jimi Hendrix pretended he was gay to get out of the US Army, a new biography reveals.

One soldier was killed and 13 injured today when grenades exploded at a US 101st Airborne Division command tent in Kuwait. A US soldier was detained as a suspect in the attack, the Army said.

The three US soldiers killed in a so-called friendly fire incident in Afghanistan have been identified.

The Taliban today claimed to have had positive talks with Northern Alliance leaders in negotiating the surrender of their troops in the besieged city of Kunduz.

The United States and its allies were today moving to seal off potential escape routes - even at sea - for terror chief Osama bin Laden.

US Defence Secretary Donald H Rumsfeld has said the new war on terrorism will be long and not start with a massive offensive.

America geared up for war yesterday with Donald Rumsfeld, the Defence Secretary, warning the country's servicemen that they would be called on to vanquish "powerful and terrible enemies" in the months ahead.