US and Iraqi troops battled insurgents in towns along the Euphrates river in western Iraq on Saturday, detaining suspected insurgents and seizing weapon caches. US troops surrounded the city of Annah, some 350 km west of Baghdad, for the seventh day, detaining dozens of Iraqis, local residents told Xinhua.

In the central city of Ramadi, the US military base in the city came under mortar attack Friday night, according to witnesses, who said huge explosions were heard inside the base. Afterwards, fierce clashes erupted in some districts in Ramadi, where many suspected insurgents were detained by US soldiers, the witnesses added.

Since the US and Iraqi troops launched the River Blitz offensive on Sunday, some 150 people were arrested and bomb-making equipment and weapons, including machine guns, mortars and rocket-propelled grenades, were seized, the US military said.

Some reports said Jordanian-born militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi, al-Qaida's operative in Iraq, has been hiding in the Haditha area, about 260 km northwest of Baghdad.

On Saturday, Iraq's interim government said its security forces were closing in upon him.

"We are really close to Zarqawi," Iraq's national security advisor Qassem Dawoud told reporters in the Shiite holy city of Najaf.

"You will hear very good news soon," he added following talks with Iraq's foremost Shiite leader Grand Ayatollah Ali al-Sistani.

Source: Xinhua