Saudi Forces Recover Head of Decapitated U.S. Hostage

Saudi forces found the head of U.S. hostage Paul M. Johnson Jr. in a refrigerator at an Islamic militant hide-out, where they killed two wanted men and seized weapons that included a surface-to-air missile, the Interior Ministry said Wednesday.

In a statement, the ministry said the head of Johnson, 49, who was killed June 18 by a group calling itself Al Qaeda in the Arabian Peninsula, was found Tuesday night when security forces stormed a villa in Riyadh, the capital.

The U.S. had recently called off the search for Johnson’s remains. He specialized in Apache helicopters for U.S. defense company Lockheed Martin Corp.

One of the slain militants, Isa Oshan, was on the list of 26 most-wanted Al Qaeda militants, the statement said.

The Interior Ministry said the shooting occurred in north Riyadh’s busy King Fahd district, where security forces were investigating a house used by supporters of “the deviant and corrupt ideology” -- a phrase used to designate the beliefs of Al Qaeda terrorist network sympathizers.

The security forces came under intense attack from bombs and rocket-propelled grenades, the ministry statement said.

They returned fire, the ministry said, “killing two of them and wounding three, who were arrested, as well as detaining the wife and three children of Saleh Awfi,” believed to be the Al Qaeda chief in the kingdom.