Iraq Official: U.S. Soldiers' Bodies Found

The bodies of two missing U.S. soldiers have been found, a senior Iraqi military official said Tuesday, but the U.S. military said it could not confirm the report.

Maj. Gen. Abdul-Aziz Mohammed said the bodies of Army Pfc. Kristian Menchaca, 23, of Houston, and Army Pfc. Thomas Lowell Tucker, 25, of Madras, Ore., were found on a street near a power plant in the town of Youssifiyah, just south of Baghdad.

U.S. Maj. Doug Powell said he could not confirm the report.

The soldiers came under attack Friday at a traffic checkpoint near Youssifiyah. A third soldier, Spc. David J. Babineau, 25, of Springfield, Mass., was killed in the attack. All three were from the 101st Airborne Division based at Fort Campbell, Ky.

An umbrella group that includes al-Qaida in Iraq claimed in a statement Monday that it had kidnapped the two U.S. soldiers, but it did not name them.

Ahmed Khalaf Falah, a farmer, has told The Associated Press that he witnessed seven masked gunmen seize the soldiers near Youssifiyah, about 12 miles south of Baghdad, in a region known as the "Triangle of Death."

The Mujahedeen Shura Council, an umbrella organization for a variety of insurgent factions led by al-Qaida in Iraq, offered no video, identification cards or other evidence to prove that they had the Americans. The group had vowed to seek revenge for the June 7 killing of Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, the leader of al-Qaida in Iraq, in a U.S. airstrike.

Kidnappings of U.S. service members have been rare since the 2003 U.S.-led invasion, despite the presence of about 130,000 forces.

The last U.S. soldier to be captured was Sgt. Keith M. Maupin of Batavia, Ohio, who was taken on April 9, 2004 after insurgents ambushed his fuel convoy. Two months later, a tape on Al-Jazeera purported to show a captive U.S. soldier shot, but the Army ruled it was inconclusive.

Six soldiers, including Pvt. Jessica Lynch, were captured in an ambush in southern Iraq in the early days of the war _ March 23, 2003. Lynch was rescued April 1, 2003, the others 12 days later.

Read More Here:Iraqi: U.S. bodies showed signs of torture