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Baghdad, 20 Oct. (AKI) - Iraqi police have
arrested one of Saddam Hussein's nephews. Officials
say Yassir Sabhawi Ibrahim - son of the deposed
dictator's half-brother Sabhawi Ibrahim Hasan al-Tikriti
- was arrested in a Baghdad apartment on Wednesday,
accused of being one of the main financiers for the
insurgency activities in Iraq. His arrest came just
a few days after the Syrian authorities forced him
to return to Iraq, the officials said, describing
his capture as a "serious blow to terrorist
networks".
Syria is said to have "pushed" Ibrahim into Iraq and
informed the US authorities of his whereabouts in
Baghdad, rather than handing him over. The Iraqi
security forces then carried out a "fast, easy" raid
on his apartment, a defence ministry official said.
He is thought to have been handling Baath Party
funds in Syria, Jordan and Yemen and coordinating a
huge network of militants inside Iraq, as well as
acting as go between for the Baathist insurgents and
the terror group of Jordanian militant Abu Musab al-Zarqawi.
Syria has been under great pressure to do more to
stop insurgents crossing and smuggling weapons
across their border into Iraq. The Syrian
authorities say they are not actively supporting the
insurgents, but argue that it is virtually
impossible to protect the border.
On September 19, Iraq's Central Criminal Court gave
Yassir's brother Ayman a life sentence on charges of
helping fund the insurgency and making bombs in the
first known trial of a member of Saddam's family.
Yassir and Ayman's father was himself captured by
Syria earlier this year and handed over to Iraq. In
July, the US Treasury Department froze the American
assets of all of al-Tikriti's six sons.
Another of the former dictator's half-brothers,
Barazan Ibrahim, was one of his seven co-defendents
in the trial that began on Wednesday over the
killing of more than 140 Shiites in the town of al-Dujail
in 1982, in retaliation for an assassination attempt
on Saddam. Ibrahim was also his former intelligence
chief.
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