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One of four American soldiers accused of raping a Iraqi girl and later killing her and her family pleaded guilty on Wednesday.

The soldier, James Barker, pleaded guilty to rape and murder at the start of his court-martial in Fort Campbell, Kentucky, and agree to testify against the others in the case, US media reported.

Barker agreed to the plea deal to avoid the death penalty, his civilian attorney David Sheldon was quoted as saying.

Barker gave an account of the event after entering his plea, detailing how he and his fellow soldiers brought up the idea, then raped the girl and killed her family at Mahmudiya, a village about 32 kilometers south of Baghdad, in March 2006.

The others charged with rape and murder in the case were Jesse Spielman, Paul Cortez, and Bryan Howard, all members of the 101st Airborne Division. A fifth person, former soldier Steven Green, had been charged in a civilian court and he pleaded not guilty to charges including murder and sexual assault.

Cortez was also arraigned Wednesday but deferred entering a plea. Howard also deferred entering a plea at his arraignment in October, and Spielman would be arraigned in December.
 
There have been several incidents in which US soldiers were accused of killing Iraqi civilians over the past year. On Nov. 19, 2005, 24 Iraqi civilians were allegedly killed by US troops in the western Iraqi town of Haditha, and in March this year, 11 Iraqi civilians, including five children, were killed during a US-led raid against a suspected al-Qaida site.

(Xinhua News Agency November 16, 2006)