US defence secretary Ash Carter has claimed the US has killed three key leaders of the Islamic State group in Syria.
Among the dead were two militants believed to be tied to the attacks in Paris in November 2015 that killed 130 people.
Mr Carter announced the killings during an address to US airmen at a military base in Italy.
Mr Carter’s spokesman, Peter Cook, said that the three were killed in an air strike on December 4th in Raqqa.
Mr Cook said the two involved in the Paris attacks, Salah Gourmat and Sammy Djedou, were close associates of Islamic State external operations leader Abu Mohammed al-Adnani - who was killed in August.
He said the third person, Walid Hamman, had been convicted in absentia in Belgium for a disrupted planned attack in 2015.
AP