BAGHDAD, Oct 31: US aircraft bombed a house close to Karabila, near Iraq’s border with Syria, before dawn on Monday in what the military said was a precision strike on an Al Qaeda leader.

A local hospital doctor in the Iraqi town of Qaim said 40 people were killed and 20 wounded, many of them women and children, and a tribal leader said no guerillas were there.

A US military spokesman said the precision bombing in Karabila, close to Qaim, was meant to avoid civilian casualties.

“We believe the targeted terrorist leader was killed, but we cannot confirm that,” Col David Lapan said.

“Civilian deaths cannot be verified and hospital officials frequently make such claims.”

“The Americans started to bomb around Betha from after midnight until dawn,” said a police official.—Reuters