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Baghdad The Islamic State group said Tuesday a US citizen carried out a suicide attack against Iraqi forces involved in an operation to retake the jihadist-held city of Tikrit. “The brother Abu Dawud al-Amriki (may Allah accept him) launched himself with his explosives-laden truck against a gathering” of Iraqi forces and militiamen, an IS radio bulletin said. The report gave no details on the man’s identity. It claimed that dozens of Iraqi forces were killed and wounded in the blast, but did not provide further details, such as pictures or footage. There was no immediate confirmation of the attack from...

In the hunt for Saddam Hussein's billions, investigators have identified five networks of more than 100 companies used to launder money skimmed from Iraqi oil sales. Saddam's gangster regime set up shell companies in Switzerland, Jordan, Lichtenstein, Luxembourg and Panama, according to investigators. Those company networks and their banking affiliations were used to enrich the former Iraqi strongman, his sons Uday and Qusay, and other family members. "Ultimately, the money was stolen from the Iraqi people," said Taylor Griffin, spokesman for the Treasury Department, which is heading the government's laundering probe along with U.S. Customs, the Secret Service and various...

Baghdad leaders reveal that coup plot duped MI6 Julie Flint explains how rumours of Saddam's overthrow caused British intelligence to miss vital information about Iraq's weapons programme British intelligence took its eyes off Saddam Hussein's weapons programmes because it had been duped into believing a military coup would leave Sunni Muslims in power in Iraq. Sources in the country say what they missed was a push to convert chemical and biological organisms into dry agents that could be hidden until pressure on the regime was lifted. 'From the second half of 2000, the focus of the British was not on...

RIYADH, Nov 2 (KUNA) -- The Custodian of the Two Holy Mosques King Abdullah bin Abdul-Aziz Al-Saud sent a letter to US President George W. Bush on releasing ousted Iraqi leader Saddam Hussein's half-brother Barazan Al-Tikriti, a Saudi daily said Wednesday. Al-Riyadh daily said the letter was of a humanitarian nature and called for showing understanding for the health conditions of Tikriti, who is suffering from cancer. The newspaper noted the US President was to look into the Saudi King's request.

From leaky roofs to secret agents: how the files I found in Iraq's looted foreign ministry cast light on the paranoid world of Saddam Hussein How many Iraqi officials does it take to fix the leaky roof of a diplomat's house in London? How long does a skilled translator need to convert one of George Galloway's parliamentary speeches into Arabic? In almost 1, 000 pages of Arabic prose, each stamped with the Eagle crest of Iraq, the files found inside the foreign ministry in Baghdad cast a somewhat surreal light on the questions that turned the bureaucratic wheels of Saddam...

Unofficial Iraqi sources told Al Bawaba Wednesday that Abed Hamoud al-Tikriti, presidential secretary of former leader Saddam Hussein died two days ago while in US custody.

<p>The Iraqi Intelligence Service established a unit to assassinate Saddam Hussein's enemies at home and abroad that claimed 66 successful "operations" between 1998 and 2000.</p> <p>Found on the floor of a looted Intelligence Service villa on the east bank of the Tigris River in Baghdad, the six-page file described the program and contained suggestions for improving its effectiveness -- including obtaining poisonous gas disguised as perfume or explosives that would detonate when the car of the target passed by.</p>

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Syria offers to expel 8 members of Saddam's inner circle in a message reaching Washington through 'Russian intelligence channels.'They are: Former Vice President Izzat Ibrahim Al-Douri, Saddams' bureau chief Abd Hamoud, Baath Party Boss Aziz Salah, Special Security Service Chief Hanni Tefalah, Republican Guard Secretary Kemal Mustafa, Republican Guard Commander Seif A-Din Suleih, Iraqi Intelligence Commander Taher Jaloul and Special Republican Guard Commander, General Barzan Suleiman Tikriti.This is Damascus's first admission to harboring Saddam Hussein's top aides.

BAGHDAD, Iraq, Apr 19, 2003 (Knight Ridder Washington Bureau - Knight Ridder/Tribune Business News via COMTEX) -- Iraqi military commanders, certain they could never counter overwhelming American air power, thought they could defeat the United States by making a bloody stand for Baghdad that would so sicken the American public that the United States would withdraw its troops and go home. So Iraqi field commanders were surprised April 8, as they were preparing to battle American incursions into the capital, when they were ordered to withdraw and return to their bases north of the city, according to an Iraqi major...

The London-based "Sunday Times" reported on 15 December that Swiss authorities allowed Barzan Tikriti to return to Iraq in October despite a request by the London-based human rights group Indict that he be prosecuted for war crimes. Tikriti is the half-brother of Iraqi President Saddam Hussein; his daughter is married to Saddam's son, Uday. Tikriti is a former Iraqi ambassador to Switzerland who previously served as director-general of the Iraqi Mukhabarat intelligence agency. An Indict dossier presented evidence to Swiss authorities 15 months ago that claimed that Tikriti "had pulled out fingernails, thrown boiling water over prisoners, beaten them with...