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| Friday, 5 December 2003 |
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US may have just missed second most wanted Iraqi KIRKUK, Iraq, Thursday (Reuters) U.S. troops probably just missed catching the second most wanted man in Iraq in a major raid, but seized important individuals among 54 suspected guerrillas detained, the U.S. military said on Wednesday. More than 1,000 soldiers scoured the small town of Hawija near the northern oil hub of Kirkuk on Tuesday but failed to find Saddam Hussein's right-hand man, Izzat Ibrahim al-Douri. "We had expected to find Izzat Ibrahim himself in a house in Hawija, but he wasn't there. It was pretty clear he had been there recently," said Sergeant Todd Oliver, a spokesman for the 173rd Airborne Brigade. Soldiers detained but later released a relative of Ibrahim, Oliver said after the raid, which lasted almost 48 hours. In a statement, the U.S. military said 54 people had been detained and one "enemy" was killed and two wounded. There were no U.S. casualties. A cache of weapons was also seized. Sources in Iraq's Governing Council said on Tuesday they had been told Ibrahim - "king of clubs" in a U.S. deck of cards of most wanted Iraqis - had been captured or killed but the American military later said he was not among the detainees. The U.S. military said last month Ibrahim was directly involved in attacks on U.S. troops and put a $10 million bounty on his head. A reward of $25 million is still on offer for information leading to the capture or death of Saddam. U.S. military officials have said suspected guerrilla leaders caught in Hawija included the heads of two cells of the Saddam Fedayeen militia and were "quality targets". Residents of Hawija were angry on Wednesday. In the small hospital that serves around 30,000 people, two heavily bandaged brothers lay side by side, both having been shot, a doctor said, by U.S. troops. "They are just farmers, they have never done anything wrong," said Dr Victor Faleh Hussein, as he held up X-rays showing the three bullets that hit one of the brothers, two in the shoulder and one in the head. Meanwhile Saddam Hussein withdrew more than $1 billion from Iraq's central bank hours before U.S. forces invaded, and some of the money may be funding the Iraqi insurgency against U.S. troops, ABC News reported. Quoting a letter purportedly written by Saddam and obtained by ABC News, and citing U.S. officials, ABC News said $132 million of funds withdrawn by the Iraqi leader is unaccounted for and may be being used by his followers to fund attacks against U.S. forces. ABC News said the handwritten letter from Saddam, dated March 19, 2003, was found by U.S. agents in the files of the Iraqi central bank, and obtained by ABC News. "We are giving, with this written note, permission for Mr. Qusay Saddam Hussein and Mr. Hekmat Mezban Ibrahiem to receive the following amounts of money: 1 - $920 million. 2 - 90 million euros. To protect and save them from American aggression," the letter said, according to an English translation provided by ABC News. Most of the cash has since been recovered by U.S. soldiers and agents in Iraq, ABC News said, but 33 boxes of newly printed $100 bills have been connected to recent attacks on U.S. forces. |
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