Posted on 03/17/2003 8:43:36 AM PST by HAL9000
Danish police have launched a manhunt after a former Iraqi army chief living under house arrest in Denmark disappeared.Nizar al-Khazraji has been held in the Danish city of Soroe since last year when an investigation was opened into allegations that he led the repression of Iraq's Kurds in the late 1980s.
His disappearance as US-led military action against Iraq looms is likely to prompt fears among Danish authorities that he has been smuggled back into the Middle East, says our correspondent Malcolm Brabant.
Despite the allegations against him, he has in the past been touted as a possible successor to Saddam Hussein if the Iraqi leader is overthrown.
'Coup planned'
His house arrest last year followed an application to travel to Saudi Arabia - from where police suspected he wanted to launch his attempt at fomenting a revolt in Iraq.
It is believed he wished to lead a coup against Saddam Hussein as a way of circumventing an invasion.
He has since made several attempts through the courts to leave the country, but all had been denied.
"I feel like a lion in a cage," he said last month when his house arrest was extended, according to the AP news agency.
"I should be in Iraq and taking the lead of the people and the military against Saddam Hussein."
The general fled to Jordan from Iraq in 1995, and has lived in Denmark since the late 1990s.
He was refused political asylum but granted leave to remain as it was judged that his life would be in danger were he to return to Iraq.
The worst single incident of which he is accused is a chemical weapon air attack on the Kurdish town of Halabjah in 1988. An estimated 5,000 people died.
Iraqi ex-general flees Denmark home -prosecutor
COPENHAGEN, March 17 (Reuters) - A former Iraqi army chief disappeared from his Danish home on Monday, defying a court ruling restricting his movements to prevent him avoiding a possible trial for war crimes, the state prosecutor said on Monday.
"The only thing we know for sure is that he has disappeared. He probably left his flat this morning," state prosecutor Birgitte Vestberg told Reuters.
Nizar al-Khazraji, suspected of crimes against Kurds in the late 1980s, is not allowed to leave Denmark. He has surrendered his passport and is required to report to police three times a week. These restrictions were imposed by a local court on November 19.
Denmark, which borders Germany, is part of the European Union's Schengen treaty which allows for people to move freely without a passport in the region.
Khazraji's family were still at their Soro home, south of Copenhagen and did not know where he was, the prosecutor said.
Khazraji was head of Iraq's armed forces from 1987 to 1990, fled to Jordan in 1995 and four years later applied for political asylum in Denmark.
He was denied asylum as immigration authorities thought it likely he was involved in chemical weapon attacks on Kurds in northern Iraq in the late 1980s. But he was allowed to stay in Denmark under special rules applied to individuals thought to be at serious risk if they return home.
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