Lebanese security officials say they have shot and killed the suspected leader of the militant Sunni Islamist movement Fatah al-Islam.
Abd-al-Rahman Awad and an associate were intercepted on a main road in eastern Lebanon and died in an exchange of fire with security forces.
Fatah al-Islam fought a three-month battle with the Lebanese army in 2007 in which about 400 people were killed.
The group is believed to be linked to the al-Qaeda terror group.
Abd-al-Rahman Awad was already high on the Lebanese wanted list.
He had been condemned to death in absentia on charges relating to a number of bomb attacks and killings over the past three years.
He was believed to have taken over the leadership of Fatah al-Islam after its long battle with the army at the Palestinian refugee camp of Nahr al-Bared near Tripoli in northern Lebanon in 2007.
According to Lebanese security officials, he had recently been hiding in the big Palestinian refugee camp of Ain al-Hilweh near Sidon in the south. BBC News
