Four helicopter crash victims were shot in head

Four of the five Americans killed when a US security company’s helicopter crashed in a dangerous Sunni neighbourhood in central Baghdad were shot execution style in the back the head, Iraqi and US officials said today.

A senior Iraqi military official said a machine gunner downed the helicopter, but a US military official in Washington said there were no indications that the aircraft, owned by Blackwater USA, had been shot out of the sky.

In Washington, a US defence official said four of the five killed were shot in the back of the head but did not know whether they were still alive when they were shot.

It also was not clear whether gunfire actually brought the small helicopter down or caused the craft to drop toward the ground, where it became entangled in electrical wires, the US official said.

The helicopter was virtually destroyed and after investigating the site, US forces had been planning to blow up it up, the official said.

US Ambassador Zalmay Khalilzad today offered condolences for the five Americans killed.