U.S. Denies Reports Al-Zarqawi Killed

(RFE/RL) 21 November 2005 -- U.S. forces left a cordoned area around a house in northern Iraq today following a gun battle in which eight suspected Al-Qaeda members were killed and 11 American soldiers were wounded.

Earlier, a White House spokesman in Washington dismissed reports that Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, head of the Al-Qaeda group in Iraq, may have been among those killed in the 19 November shootout in Mosul.

In other violence, at least four civilians were killed when a car bomb blew up today in Kanan, northeast of Baghdad.

In the capital, three people, including one police officer, were killed by gunmen.

Also today, Iraq's Foreign Ministry said a national reconciliation conference, expected to take place in late February or early March in Baghdad, will decide on and call for a timetable for withdrawing foreign troops from Iraq.

The decision was reached on 20 November at an Arab League-sponsored meeting in Cairo.

(AP/AFP)