Claims Iraqi commander was bribed

PARIS - Baghdad fell without a fight in April because the United States had bribed the commander of the "special" Republican Guard unit defending the city, a French newspaper reported yesterday.

General Maher Soufiane al-Takriti, a cousin of Saddam Hussein, received a multi-million dollar bribe, and the promise of safe conduct for himself and his family, according to the Journal du Dimanche.

An unnamed senior official in the deposed Saddam regime said the general had been bought by the Americans many months before the invasion began in March. Hence, the confidence of the Pentagon that they could capture Baghdad without heavy losses.

When American forces surrounded the Iraqi capital, Soufiane al-Takriti ordered the 10,000 members of the special Republican Guard - supposedly Saddam's most loyal, elite force - not to resist the Americans and to return to their homes, the newspaper said.

The general was flown out of Baghdad Airport, with his family, on April 8, the day before the city fell.

The same day, US Marines reported that he had been killed while approaching a road-block on the edge of Baghdad.

The general was not the only senior Iraqi figure spirited out of Iraq through Baghdad Airport in the days just before and after the capture of the capital, the newspaper reported. Other senior officials and military commanders who had been bribed by the US also escaped through the airport - hence the drive by American forces to capture its buildings and runways intact.

The escapers included General Ali Abdel Rachid al-Takriti, secretary to the Iraqi high military command, who had informed the Americans of Iraqi troop movements, and a commander of the irregular forces, the Fedayeen Saddam (unnamed by the newspaper).

Soufiane al-Takriti, a distant cousin of Saddam's, was the deputy of Saddam's son Qusay and the commander of the special Republican Guard division, deployed in and around the capital. He had been approached by the Americans some time during 2002. He agreed to work for Washington in return for several million dollars and a new life for himself and 20 members of his immediate family.

Meanwhile, one of Saddam's sons tried to contact US occupation officials in Baghdad through an intermediary to negotiate a safe surrender, Time magazine reported.

The report said a relative had approached an intermediary asking the US if Uday Hussein could "work out something" or "get some kind of immunity".

The magazine cited a family servant and another source familiar with the communications as saying that Saddam, Uday and Qusay, had survived the two US attempts on Saddam's life.

- INDEPENDENT

Herald Feature: Iraq