Two US pilots die in helicopter crash

A US Apache attack helicopter crashed yesterday north of Baghdad, killing both pilots as US Defence Secretary Donald Rumsfeld said it may take as long as 12 years to defeat the insurgents.

Later yesterday, a car bomb exploded between a movie house and Sunni Arab mosque in eastern Baghdad, killing at least four people and injuring 16, authorities said.

The AH-64 crashed in Mishahda, 32 kilometres north of the capital, and was in flames on the ground, an Associated Press reporter at the scene said. Witness Mohammed Naji said he saw two helicopters flying toward Mishahda when “a rocket hit one of them and destroyed it completely in the air”.