Seven Al-Qaeda suspects killed in Saudi clashes

RIYADH - Seven suspected Al-Qaeda militants were killed in a fierce gunbattle which flared Sunday with Saudi security forces in the north of the kingdom, the interior ministry said Monday.
Seven members of "the deviant group" -- official terminology for Al-Qaeda suspects -- were killed, and an eighth was critically injured, in the clash in the town of Al-Rass in the Al-Qassim region, some 320 kilometers (200 miles) north of Riyadh, it said in a statement carried by the SPA news agency.
A number of security men were slightly wounded, the ministry said, adding that security forces were continuing to "cleanse" the scene of the clash.

04/04/2005 13:55 GMT