Saddam captured in hideout

BAGHDAD, Iraq: Without firing a shot, American forces captured a bearded and haggard-looking Saddam Hussein in an underground hide-out on a farm near his hometown of Tikrit, ending one of the most intensive manhunts in history. The arrest was a huge victory for US forces battling an insurgency by the ousted dictator’s followers. In the capital, radio stations played celebratory music, residents fired small arms in the air in celebration and passengers on buses and trucks shouted, “They got Saddam! They got Saddam!” After sundown, large explosions were heard in central Baghdad, and flames and thick smoke were seen; a policeman said there were no casualties. “The former dictator of Iraq will face the justice he denied to millions,” President Bush said in a midday televised address from the White House, eight months after American troops swept into Baghdad and toppled Saddam’s regime. “In the history of Iraq, a dark and painful era is over. A hopeful day has arrived.”

Washington hopes Saddam’s capture will help break the organised Iraq resistance that has killed more than 190 American soldiers since Bush declared major combat over on May 1 and has set back efforts at reconstruction. But Major General Ray Odierno, commander of the 4th Infantry Division, which captured Saddam, said the ousted leader did not appear to be directly organising resistance — noting no communication devices were found in his hiding place. “I believe he was there more for moral support,” Odierno said. Saddam’s capture was based on information from a member of a family “close to him,” Odierno told reporters in Tikrit. The crucial information came after prisoners from raids and intelligence tips led to increasingly precise information, as CIA and military analysts gradually narrowed down their list of potential sites where Saddam was staying, a US official said. The capture took place at 8:30 pm Saturday (local day and time) at one of dozens of safehouses Saddam is thought to have: a walled compound on a farm in Adwar, a town ten miles from Tikrit, not far from one of Saddam’s former palaces, Odierno said.

“I think it’s rather ironic that he was in a hole in the ground across the river from these great palaces that he built,” Odierno said. The event comes almost five months after his sons, Qusai and Odai, were killed July 22 in a four-hour gunbattle with US troops in a hideout in the northern city of Mosul. There was hope at the time that the sons’ deaths would dampen the Iraqi resistance to the US occupation. But since then, the guerrilla campaign has mounted dramatically. In the latest attack, a suspected suicide bomber detonated explosives in a car outside a police station yesterday morning west of Baghdad, killing at least 17 people and wounding 33 more, the US military said. Also yesterday, a US soldier died while trying to disarm a roadside bomb south of the capital — the 452nd soldier to die in Iraq. Saddam was one of the most-wanted fugitives in the world, along with Osama bin Laden, the leader of the al-Qaeida terrorist network who has not been caught despite a manhunt since November 2001, when the Taliban regime was overthrown in Afghanistan.

“Ladies and gentlemen, we got him,” US administrator L Paul Bremer told a news conference. “The tyrant is a prisoner.” Some 600 troops and special forces were involved in the raid that netted Saddam — though not all were aware beforehand that the objective was “High Value Target No 1,” Odierno said. Troops found the ousted leader, armed with a pistol, hiding in an underground crawl space at the walled compound, Odierno said. Rugs and dirt covered the Styrofoam lid covering the entrance to the hiding place, a few feet from a small, mud-brick hut where Saddam had been staying. The hut consisted of two rooms, a bedroom with clothes scattered about and a “rudimentary kitchen,” Odierno said. The commander said Saddam likely had been there only a short time, noting that new shirts, still unwrapped, were found in the bedroom. Saddam was “very disoriented” as soldiers brought him out of the hole, Odierno said. A Pentagon diagram showed the hiding place as a six-foot-deep vertical tunnel, with a shorter tunnel branching out horizontally from one side. A pipe to the concrete surface at ground level provided air.

Saddam didn’t fire his weapon. “There was no way he could fight back so he was just caught like a rat,” Odierno said. Two other Iraqis — described as low-level regime figures — were arrested in the raid, and soldiers found two Kalashnikov rifles, a pistol, a taxi and $750,000 in $100 bills. A US defence official, who spoke on condition of anonymity, said Saddam admitted his identity when captured Lt Gen Ricardo Sanchez, the top US military commander in Iraq, who saw Saddam overnight, said the deposed leader “has been cooperative and is talkative.” He described Saddam as “a tired man, a man resigned to his fate.”   

Bush greets Saddam’s capture as ‘enchanting day’ 

WASHINGTON: In a major coup for his beleaguered Iraq campaign, President George W Bush yesterday revelled in the capture of Saddam Hussein as an “enchanting day” for the Iraqi people and final proof their long-time leader was gone. White House spokesman Scott McClellan told reporters Bush was calling world leaders, including British Prime Minister Tony Blair, following which he spoke to the American people from the White House. While clearly elated, Bush aides cautioned that the dramatic military operation that netted Saddam after a massive manhunt probably would not end the guerrilla insurgency against the US occupation.

“The Iraqi people can finally be assured that Saddam Hussein will not be coming back. They can see it for themselves,” McClellan said. Bush was informed just before dawn on Sunday that US troops had captured the ousted Iraqi dictator near his home town of Tikrit. He immediately called key Iraq war allies with the news of the capture, including British Prime Minister Tony Blair and Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar. Noticeably absent from the long list of congratulatory calls were the leaders of France, Germany and Russia, which opposed the war. “The message to the Iraqi people is that the blanket of fear is beginning to lift,” a senior White House official said. Capturing Saddam represents a major victory for the president, who is seeking re-election next year, and could boost his standing in the polls. His approval ratings were hard-hit by escalating violence against US troops after Baghdad’s fall.       

Iraqis celebrate 

BAGHDAD: Most Iraqis rejoiced over Saddam Hussein’s capture yesterday, with Shi’ite Muslims demanding trial for the man they saw as their oppressor, but Sunnis said resistance to the US occupation would continue. “He oppressed us. He lacked a minimum of modesty and decency. We wait to see him on trial,” said Abas Hamid, owner of a fruit stall in front of the Kazimain mosque, one of the holiest sites of Shi’ite Islam. The mood was one of celebration in the capital’s Shi’ite district, which has been seeing increased business from Iranian pilgrims. The sound of gunfire celebrating Saddam’s capture was deafening. “Saddam’s rhetoric of resistance had no popularity among us Shi’ites. A resistance will develop if the Americans do not hand us power,” Hamid said, referring to calls made by the former Iraqi leader to resist the US occupation.

Shi’ites, who form a majority in Iraq, say Saddam, a Sunni Muslim from central Iraq, denied them temporal power. The Shi’ites rebelled against Saddam in 1991, but were defeated when Western forces allowed Saddam to crush the rebellion. Hamid, a baker making fresh Iraqi samoun bread, was in a hurry to go home to watch photos proving Saddam’s capture. “Most of my family are either dead or were forced into the army because of Saddam. Every Iraqi should have the right to reclaim justice from him,” he said. “Whatever they do with Saddam it will not be enough,” said Ala Abed, a policeman. In contrast, the mood was sombre across the Tigris river in the Muslim Sunni district of Azamieh, where Saddam is believed to have made his last public appearance in front of the main Abu Hanifah mosque.

“The Americans are mistaken if they think Saddam’s capture will demoralise the resistance. The resistance is nationalist and religious in nature. Saddam barely influenced it,” said Numan Adel Karim, a custodian of the mosque, named after one of the foremost theologians in Sunni Islam. Men who were killed fighting US forces after the invasion are buried in the mosque’s graveyard. “The Americans have the misfortune of dealing with the most viscous people in the world. There is a new resistance developing independent of Saddam,” said Abdelatif Juma.

Blair: Saddam’s capture a triumph for Muslims

LONDON: British Prime Minister Tony Blair said yesterday that the Muslims who suffered under former Iraqi President Saddam Hussein would benefit most from his capture and the new conditions in Iraq. “The rebirth of Iraq is the death of their (anti-coalition factions’) attempt to sell the lie that we are fighting Muslims,” Blair told reporters minutes after speaking to US President George W Bush by telephone. “Muslims were Saddam’s victims, Muslims today in Iraq are the beneficiaries of his demise. Let’s remember all those Iraqis that died under Saddam, the remains of 400,000 human beings already found in mass graves.”

Looking solemn and eschewing triumphalism, Blair gave no details of his conversation with Bush, whose war on Iraq he backed despite opposition from the majority of Britons. “The shadow of Saddam has finally lifted from the Iraqi people,” he said. “We give thanks for that but let this be more than a case simply for rejoicing. Let it be a moment to reach out and reconcile. “Where his rule meant terror and division and brutality, let his capture bring about unity, reconciliation and peace between all the people in Iraq.” Blair said it was for Iraqi people to determine how Saddam is treated now.
“Saddam has gone from power, he won’t be coming back. That Iraqi people now know and it is they who will decide his fate.”

Special court to try Saddam rule crimes

LONDON: Iraqi National Congress leader Ahmad Chalabi said on Sunday former President Saddam Hussein would be handed over to the Iraqi people for trial in the very near future.
Following are some details about a special tribunal to be set up by the Governing Council in Iraq to try crimes committed under Saddam’s rule:
* The US-appointed Governing Council has set up a court to try prominent Iraqis in Saddam’s government and thousands of Iraqis currently detained by US forces.
* About 40 of the 55 most wanted officials are under US supervision, including Saddam, who was found by US troops hiding in a hole near his home town of Tikrit on Sunday. He may face charges of crimes against humanity.
* US officials hope prosecuting Saddam’s top lieutenants will bolster support for the Governing Council and convince Iraqis the old regime will not return.
* Abdel Aziz al-Hakim, head of the US-appointed Governing Council, hopes to approve setting up the tribunal in late December or the beginning of next year.
* Hakim wants the court to be one of the functions of a sovereign Iraqi authority to which Washington hopes to transfer power by the end of June next year.
* The tribunal will be run by Iraqis under Iraqi criminal law and will also be open to the public. There will be five judges.
* Judges from the United Nations or foreign countries may also sit on the tribunals as observers.
* The death penalty which has been suspended under US-occupied Iraq could be reintroduced under the jurisdiction of the court.

Aznar: Saddam’s arrest opens way to peace

MADRID: Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, one of US President George W Bush’s staunchest allies in the war in Iraq, said yesterday the capture of Saddam Hussein removed the main obstacle to peace and democracy in Iraq. “The tyrant, who defied the United Nations, has fallen,” Aznar said in a statement he read to television cameras. “Today, the moment has arrived for him to pay for his crimes. “Happily, today the main obstacle to peace, freedom and democracy in Iraq has disappeared,” said Aznar, who hailed coalition troops, including 1,300 Spanish, in Iraq. A government spokesman said Aznar had spoken with Bush by telephone about Saddam’s capture.

Kuwaitis overjoyed at Saddam’s capture

KUWAIT: Kuwaitis, invaded by Saddam Hussein’s forces in 1990, were elated yesterday at his capture, saying the volatile region had been freed from a nightmare. “This is the most beautiful news I’ve heard!” said Hussein al-Haddad, 47. “Iraq will now be stabilised and everything in Kuwait will be more positive.” Kuwaiti motorists honked their horns and waved to each other, revelling in the moment. “The whole region will be free of the nightmare,” said Hussein Ahmad, 60. “I am so happy, I can’t even describe it. I had family killed in Iraq so I hope they have actually caught him, and put the whole region at ease.” Scores of people hit the main seaside Gulf Road to celebrate after hearing of his capture.