BAGHDAD, Nov. 2 (UPI) -- With mounting violence going unabated, U.S.-backed Iraqi forces seized a key insurgency leader blamed for bombings in the oil-center of Kirkuk in north Iraq.
A security source said Thursday the deputy leader of "Jamaat Ansar al-Sunna" (Group of Sunni Partisans) was captured in a raid conducted by U.S. and Iraqi forces in a suburb of Kirkuk Wednesday.
"A joint force from the Iraqi army and the multinational troops captured last night (Wednesday) Nahed Ahmed Karkar, the right-hand man of the emir of Jamaat Ansar al-Sunna in an operation east of Kirkuk," the source said.
He noted that Karkar is accused of involvement in attacks and bombings against civilians and security forces in Kirkuk, 169 miles north of Baghdad.
Karkar is being interrogated to uncover the group's cells and the circumstances of the attacks they carried out.
Also Thursday, the U.S. army announced the death of an American soldier in an explosion that ripped through his military vehicle west of Baghdad Wednesday night.
The U.S. casualty was the first this month, following a record toll of 104 American troop deaths in October.
A car bomb also ripped through a popular market in the town of Mahmoudiyeh, south of Baghdad, killing four civilians and injuring two, as part of rampant violence sweeping the war-torn Arab country.
