Website claims new al-Qaida leader killed US soldiers

The new leader of al-Qaida in Iraq killed the two US soldiers abducted last week, an umbrella group for Iraqi insurgents said in a web statement posted today.

The statement said the two soldiers were “slaughtered” suggesting they had been beheaded by Abu Hamza al-Muhajer. The Arabic word used in the statement, “nahr”, is used for the slaughtering of sheep by cutting the throat and has been used in past statements to refer to beheadings.