Look Who’s Talking (Saddam's half brother)

abc ^ | 4/18/03

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Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al Tikriti, Saddam Hussein's half brother, was one of 55 senior Iraqi figures wanted by the United States. (AP Photo/Department of Defense)

Saddam’s Half Brother Talking to U.S. Captors; Federal Agents Head to Iraq

B A G H D A D, Iraq, April 18 — Saddam Hussein's half brother, the one-time head of Iraq's feared intelligence agency, is talking to his U.S. captors, ABCNEWS has learned.

U.S. officials hope to learn the whereabouts of senior regime figures, as well as information about suspected weapons programs, from Barzan Ibrahim Hasan al Tikriti, sources said. His capture in Baghdad was announced Thursday by Brig. Gen. Vincent Brooks at a Central Command press briefing in Qatar.

A trusted adviser to Saddam, al Tikriti served as Iraq's ambassador to Switzerland during the 1990s. He is believed to have been one of the regime's top money men, setting up secret bank accounts to buy illegal weapons.

He was the five of clubs in a deck of cards bearing the 55 most-wanted Iraqi figures released by the Pentagon earlier this month, and the second of Saddam's three half brothers to be nabbed in recent days. Coalition forces on Sunday announced the capture of Watban Ibrahim Hasan al Tikriti, a senior presidential adviser.

The third half brother, Sab'awi Ibrahim Hasan al Tikriti, is still at large. He is the six of diamonds in the deck of Iraq's most-wanted figures, and there are reports he has fled to Syria.

Federal Agents to Head to Iraq

To better focus the kind of information U.S. officials expect to get from captured Iraqi leaders, Washington is sending a sophisticated team of intelligence specialists to be based inside Iraq, sources told ABCNEWS.

They will translate and evaluate hundreds of tons of documents, interrogate prisoners, look for bank accounts and evidence of war crimes, and intensify the search for regime leaders and weapons of mass destruction.

Washington is assembling a team of as many as 1,500 people drawn from a variety of federal agencies, including the Defense, Justice and Treasury departments, to find chemical and biological weapons in Iraq, sources told ABCNEWS.

They said the Defense Department has also asked 30 to 40 U.N. weapons inspectors to participate.

The FBI is also sending agents to Iraq to engage in another kind of hunt. Agents are expected to arrive in the coming days to assist in the recovery of antiquities looted from museums and archaeological sites.

"We are firmly committed to doing whatever we can to secure these treasures to the people of Iraq," FBI Director Robert Mueller told a news conference Thursday.

Two Bush cultural advisers have resigned over U.S. forces' failure to prevent looting from Baghdad's ancient history museum.

In addition to priceless historical artifacts, looters may have made off with potential biological weapons. ABCNEWS' Brian Ross reported that the Central Public Health Laboratory in Baghdad is missing several vials containing deadly pathogens — including black fever, cholera, HIV and polio.

• Dangerous Viruses Lost in Iraq

The U.S. military is worried the missing viruses could be used as weapons, Ross said.