US captures top al Qaeda operative Abd al Hadi al-Iraqi, Abu Abdullah, described as senior global lieutenant to Osama bin Laden
A Pentagon statement does not say where he was captured, only that he was caught attempting to return to Iraq, his native country, to take charge of al Qaeda’s affairs and possibly overseas operations. On his way he met an al Qaeda operative in Iran. The CIA handed a-Hadi to the Pentagon which has confined him in Guantanamo Bay.
Born in Mosul in 1960, a million dollar-reward was offered for his capture. He is 29th on Iraq’s most wanted terrorist list. In the 90s, he was a paramilitary leader in Afghanistan. During 2002-04, the captured man led efforts to attack U.S. forces in Afghanistan from Pakistan. He is also said to have plotted Pakistani president Pervez Musharraf’s assassination.