Sadr aide held over killing of U.S. soldiers

BAGHDAD (Reuters) - U.S. forces have captured a senior aide to anti-American Shi'ite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr over the killing of five U.S. soldiers in the Iraqi holy city of Kerbala in January, the U.S. military said on Thursday.

"Over the past several days, coalition forces in Basra and Hilla captured Qais Khazaali, his brother Laith Khazaali, and several other members of the Khazaali network, an organization directly connected to the kidnapping and murder in January of five American soldiers in Kerbala," the military said in a statement.

Qais Khazaali is a former spokesman for Sadr and now a senior aide to the cleric.

Four U.S. soldiers were abducted from an Iraqi local government compound during an apparently complex assault by guerrillas posing as Americans in Kerbala on January 20.

The military said at the time that three of the four were found dead by Iraqi police and one died on his way to hospital. In all, five soldiers were killed in what the U.S. military described as a sophisticated, well-rehearsed attack.

The attackers spoke English, wore American-looking uniforms and carried U.S.-type weapons, which got them through Iraqi checkpoints to reach the provincial compound.