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"World's most dangerous woman" heads Iraq's weapons programme
Channel NewsAsia | December 9, 2002 Monday | Staff

Posted on 12/09/2002 8:08:02 AM PST by Wallaby

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"World's most dangerous woman" heads Iraq's weapons programme

Channel NewsAsia

December 9, 2002 Monday


The name Rihab Rashida Taha may not be familiar to many, but she has been dubbed the world's most dangerous woman for heading Iraq's biological weapons programme.


The woman, nicknamed "Doctor Germ" by UN inspectors, then admitted the factory made enough anthrax and botulinum to kill millions.
Her name comes second only to her boss -- Saddam Hussein -- on the US list of Middle Eastern enemies. Born in Iraq in 1956, Dr Taha travelled to the United Kingdom in the late 1970s to pursue a PhD in microbiology.

The powerful yet elusive scientist became Production Chief of Iraq's Biological Warfare Programme, and is believed to be behind the manufacture of an estimated 10 billion doses of deadly viruses and bacteria.

That is enough lethal germs to kill every human on the planet.

But Iraq denies that it had such capabilities.

When UN weapons inspectors first arrived after the Gulf War, Dr Taha told them only a tiny number of biological weapons had been produced, and all had since been destroyed.

The inspectors however did not believe her.

She kept mum about one secret germ warfare factory she supervised at Al Hakam which was detroyed by UN weapons inspectors.

She claimed it made chicken feed.

But it became more difficult to lie when President Saddam's son-in-law defected and told how Dr Taha had worked on previously unknown forms of germ warfare.

The woman, nicknamed "Doctor Germ" by UN inspectors, then admitted the factory made enough anthrax and botulinum to kill millions.

Little has been heard of Dr Taha since the UN inspectors left Iraq in 1998.

And much like the woman at the helm, Iraq's biological weapons programme is the most feared and least understood of the country's weapons of mass destruction.

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TOPICS: Anthrax Scare; Foreign Affairs
KEYWORDS: anthrax; biowarfare; iraq
Note to those who read the title and the comments before reading the article: this is an anthrax thread, not a Hillary thread.
1 posted on 12/09/2002 8:08:02 AM PST by Wallaby
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To: Wallaby
"Note to those who read the title and the comments before reading the article: this is an anthrax thread, not a Hillary thread."

I see nothing misleading about your post. Clearly, if it had been a Hillary item, you would have flagged it with a mandatory BARF ALERT.
2 posted on 12/09/2002 8:23:55 AM PST by hauerf
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To: Wallaby
The first woman to head a biological weapon's program - another reason for the US media to swoon over the Hussein regime.
3 posted on 12/09/2002 8:26:11 AM PST by skeeter
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To: *Bio_warfare
http://www.freerepublic.com/perl/bump-list
4 posted on 12/09/2002 9:43:33 AM PST by Free the USA
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To: skeeter; sarcasm; The Great Satan; aristeides
Dr. Germ
5 posted on 12/09/2002 2:48:42 PM PST by Wallaby
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To: Wallaby
Note to those who read the title and the comments before reading the article: this is an anthrax thread, not a Hillary thread.

Mind reader!

6 posted on 12/09/2002 2:51:16 PM PST by lonestar
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To: Wallaby
NY Post had a headline last year calling her "Dr. Death".
7 posted on 12/09/2002 2:55:46 PM PST by aristeides
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To: hauerf
>mandatory BARF ALERT

Normally, perhaps, but the warning is only mandatory if the piece puts her in anything but an unfavorable light.

8 posted on 12/09/2002 2:55:53 PM PST by Wallaby
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To: aristeides
The Newsweek just out today gives her a mention. Claims she is supposed to have retired.
Already there are unconfirmed reports that some scientists or their families are interned in special camps. The reputed founder of Iraq's bioweapons program, Abdul Nasser Hindawi, was jailed in 1998 for allegedly trying to defect. And the most famous of all, the woman known as Dr. Germ, Rihab Taha, is supposed to have retired. But the human shell game Saddam has played with his scientists in the past is his most complex gambit. Former inspectors know he created a complex web of lies and fictional relationships to deceive them.
"The Secrets of Dr. Germ," Christopher Dickey and Colin Soloway; With Rod Nordland in Amman and Dan Blumenthal in New York, Newsweek, December 9, 2002.
9 posted on 12/09/2002 2:58:15 PM PST by Wallaby
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To: aristeides
Here's another description of her in yesterday's Telegraph:
Among scientists the inspectors want to question are Dr Rihab Taha, a biological weapons expert known as "Dr Germ" who is now described as a Baghdad housewife, and Hazem Ali, a virologist who was said to be no more than a university tutor in 1998.
" Iraq hides key weapons staff to thwart UN ," DAVID WASTELL AND INIGO GILMORE in Jerusalem , Sunday Telegraph, December 8, 2002.
10 posted on 12/09/2002 3:01:12 PM PST by Wallaby
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To: Wallaby
Supposed to have retired, and Iraq claims to have no weapons of mass destruction.
11 posted on 12/09/2002 3:01:16 PM PST by aristeides
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To: aristeides
Here's a bit more information on where to find her:
Scott Ritter, a former UNSCOM inspector tasked with controlling Iraqi weapon stocks, believes there's no point in trying to find biological or chemical weapons in Iraq. He claims that UN anti-proliferation officials should look instead at just one person, Rihab Taha Al Azoui, the head of the regime's biological weapons program. Called "Mrs. Germ" by her critics, she is married to oil minister gen. Amer Rachid. Aged 48, and born into a wealthy family in Baghdad, she joined the Baath party at early age. After graduating with a chemistry degree, she was given a scholarship by the education ministry to study for a PhD in the United Kingdom. Living in that country for a number of years, she followed courses dispensed by John Turner, her research tutor. A renowned biologist, he suggested she conduct a survey on the damage caused by the fermentation of mushrooms in cereals. She won her PhD with her dissertation in London in 1984 and decided to return to Baghdad. But at the time war was raging between Iraq and Iran and Saddam Hussein's regime was looking for an alternative to nuclear weapons following the Israeli air force's destruction of the Osirak reactor in 1982. Al Azaoui was chosen to head a research team in the biological field. She came into possession of dangerous viruses from the Pasteur Institute in Paris at the ATCC in Atlanta. One of her first facilities, the El Hakam laboratory in the southern suburb of Baghdad, was destroyed by U.S. bombs. Al Azaoui lives at present with her husband and their eight-year-old daughter in the wealthy El Mansour district of Baghdad. The CIA and MI6 take a strong interest in her.
"Rihab Taha Al Azoui (Iraq)," Intelligence Newsletter, WHO'S WHO; N. 401, March 8, 2001.
12 posted on 12/09/2002 3:06:52 PM PST by Wallaby
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